


What Changed Your Mind?

by kitkat9g



Category: The Walking Dead, beth greene - Fandom, bethyl - Fandom, daryl dixon - Fandom
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-13
Updated: 2015-06-23
Packaged: 2018-02-21 00:53:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 21
Words: 26,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2449310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kitkat9g/pseuds/kitkat9g





	1. Chapter 1

**Beth:**

"Do you have to go?" I'd pleaded with him to stay for ten minutes by now. He nodded. "They need everybody they can get." I sighed. "Fine. You're right. Just come back. Okay?" He smiled at me. "Okay." I gave him a peck on the lips and started back toward the fence for cleanup. "Aren't you going to say goodbye?" I smiled as he called after me. "Nope." I hated goodbyes. It felt like I was never going to see the person again, even if they'd only be gone a few hours. I passed Daryl as I walked away. "It's like a damn romance novel." I kept on walking. I wasn't about to let anything he said about Zach and I bother me. I walked up to the fence and picked up the sharpened cane I'd left there a while ago. I sighed heavily and thought about anything and everything that could and would go bad for the group on the supply run as I stabbed at walkers up against the fence. "They'll be okay you know." I glanced over at Karen. "How can you be so sure?" She stopped stabbing. "Honestly, I'm not. I just tell myself they will. You have Zach out there and I have Tyreese. I want them to come back safely as much as you, or anyone else, does." I turned toward her and nodded slowly. "Everyone wants them home safely. We all need them. I'm sorry I doubted your reasoning. I should have known better." She nodded understandingly and patted me on the back as we went back to stabbing through the fence.

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**

_Dear Diary, The supply run group has been gone for hours now. They weren't supposed to go very far, so I thought they'd be back by now, but they aren't. They should be back by the end of the night or tomorrow morning, but I hope it's soon. I miss Zach. Karen said they'd come home safe, but I don't know if I can believe like she does. It just seems like nothing goes right anymore.The world's no good now. While we were cleaning up the fence, a walker showed up with a bloody mouth and eyes. I think it died from some sort of sickness. It wasn't bleeding because of a wound. It was almost as if it had cried blood and thrown up blood before it died. I'll talk to daddy and Rick about it as soon as the group is back, so I'll have a clear head. The group's back and Daryl's here, so I guess I'll go for now. I'm gonna go find Zach. ***Beth***_

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**

I looked up. "Hey." I said. "Hey." I saw the sad look on Daryl's face. "What is it?" He looked down. "Zach." _Uh oh. They didn't all come back safely, did they?_ I knew something would happen. Something always happened. "Is he dead?" Daryl looked back down to the floor. I knew what it meant though. Zach hadn't come back at all. "Okay." I said, sitting up in my bed and moving to change my sign. I'd found a 'Days without an accident' sign in an old factory on one of our runs. We were up to thirty already, but not anymore. I pulled the three off the sign and held it in my hands. I could feel Daryl watching me, looking for my reaction. "What?" He shook his head. "I don't cry anymore, Daryl. . . I'm just. . . glad I got to know him, you know?" He nodded. "Me too." I looked up at him. "Are you okay?" He looked down at the floor then back up at me. "I'm just tired of losin' people, that's all." There was a long pause. I stepped toward him and wrapped my arms around him. "I'm glad I didn't say goodbye. I hate goodbyes." He put his hands on my elbows, sorta hugging me back. "Me too." I looked up into his eyes and let go of him. I went back to my bed and added to my diary entry.

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**

P.S. So they didn't all come back. Zach's dead. I'm glad I didn't say goodbye to him though. I knew something would happen. Everyone else is safe though. ***Beth***

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**

I couldn't sleep that night. I stared at my ceiling and thought about my conversation with Daryl. He was a tough guy, about as tough as anyone gets, but he was hurt by Zach's death too, I could tell. Though he didn't ever talk about any of it, you could tell Daryl had been through a lot before all of this. Before the walkers, the death, the fear of other people and not making it to see tomorrow. Whatever he had been through had hardened him. Turned him into a man built for the world we were living in. If anyone in the world would make it, it'd be Daryl Dixon.


	2. Chapter 2

**Beth:**

_I watched as the colors swirled around me like wind. Swirls of red, blue, green. Purple, yellow, orange. I could smell the lilacs on the bushes to my left, and the tulips in the field to my right. I closed my eyes and took it all in. I opened my eyes again when I felt a tiny breeze by my face. A butterfly, a monarch, flew around my head and around this paradise while I looked on. I grinned from ear to ear, my nightmare was over, replaced by this wonderful, colorful, world. I wasn't alone in this world. Everyone I cared about, everyone from the prison, Rick, Daryl, Michonne, Maggie, Daddy, and all the others, even Lori and Zach were there. Our living hell had come to a beautiful close. I walked over to Zach and touched his shoulder. He was facing away from me, and turned around when he felt my touch. As he turned to face me, I realized he wasn't the same. His skin was rotting, his eyes discolored and sunken in. His lips were peeled back to reveal gnarly, rotten teeth. Zach was a walker. The stench of rotting flesh saturated the air, making it hard to breathe as the sky grew dark and all the flowers wilted, the butterfly dropping dead at my feet. I panicked, my heart beating out of my chest. I snatched my hand from Zach's shoulder and shrieked. At the sound of my voice, everyone else turned to face me. All of them now wore torn clothes and rotting skin. Walkers. They were all dead. At once they lurched forward and staggared toward me at an alarming pace. I turned to run but my pounding feet were taking me nowhere. I pushed myself faster, faster, faster, but still I ran in place. I glanced back and they were gaining on me, and fast. I let out a wail as Zach's walking corpse grabbed ahold of my shoulder and the group surrounded me._

"NO!" I woke up drenched in sweat and heard the sound of footsteps racing toward my cell. I scooted back to the corner of the bed and bawled my eyes out. I hadn't noticed that someone had come in until I heard Maggie's voice. "Beth." When I saw her I cried harder and wrapped my arms around her neck, burying my face in her shoulder. "You're not dead!" She held me while I cried, moving her hand up and down my back. "Of course I'm not. Beth, it was just a dream."

Daddy came in then. "You alright Bethy?" He looked at me, concerned. I wiped furiously at my eyes, trying to get the tears to go away. I nodded and sniffled.

"It was just a nightmare." He sat down on the bed as Maggie patted my back and let go of me.

"Well why don't you tell us about it. It'll help you get it off your mind." I nodded and tried to force a smile for him.

 

**Daryl:**

I heard the scream, and I knew right away who it was. I bet she was dreaming about Zach. Maybe even the rest of us. I wished I woulda' gone to her cell to talk to her, but she had her Dad and Maggie for that. She didn't need me there. I had to admit, I still cared though. I also heard someone shufflin' though the cellblock toward the shower room, coughin' the whole way. Didn't hear any more of it, so I rolled over and went back to sleep. The fence needed fixin'. Walkers were pushin' it over. I was outside with Maggie n' Rick, cuttin' logs to hold up the chain-link. "HELP!!! HELP!!!" Maggie, Rick, n' my head shot up. Glenn came flyin' outta the prison.

"WALKERS IN D!" Rick looked at Maggie n' I.

"I got this. You go!" Maggie n' I took off after Glenn, back inside to who knew what. Maggie: When we got to Block D, all hell had broken loose. People were screamin' and dartin' around for their lives. Daryl fired a bolt into one of the walkers' head, dropping it. I fired a round into another as a third took a bite outta Lizzie and Mika's dad. "NO!" Carol ran over to the man, helping him to his cell and tryin' to care for him. Daryl scooped Luke up just as a walker was about to grab him. I heard growling behind me and spun around, firing a shot and taking down another walker. By the time we had cleared the walkers out, we had lost Lizzie and Mika's father, and at least three others from Woodbury. Daryl and I followed a trail of blood droplets back to the shower room and found a huge puddle of blood on the floor with a pair of glasses. Patrick. I looked down to the floor.

"Aw man. Patrick?" I didn't have any words for what had happened. We turned around and followed the trail back up the stairs to one of the stairs. Inside, we found Patrick's body, a bolt through his head.

**Beth:**

The guys dragged all the bodies outside and burned them. Daddy told them the bodies had to be burned because some kind of illness had killed Patrick. When they found Patrick's body, the bed in the cell was covered in blood and chunks of intestines had been spilled on the floor. Patrick had partially eaten another of the former Woodbury residents. A chain reaction started when that resident turned, because everyone was sleeping at the time. Daddy said that we had to separate the people who were already exposed, the healthy, and the most vulnerable people, to help prevent the disease from spreading. So I went in with the kids to take care of Judith. People who were already exposed were kept away from us, and those who weren't exposed were kept away from us all. The sickness started to spread really quickly after that. It started with Karen and David. Tyreese brought Karen down, coughing, where she was put into Block D, in isolation, letting us know that David had been coughing too. I could hear the yelling from inside the library, where the kids and I were. Something about killing and burning someone. When Maggie came and sat on the other side of the door that night to talk to me, she said that someone had killed Karen and David and set their bodies on fire. She said Tyreese had freaked out on everybody and Rick gave him a black eye in the process of stopping him. Daryl: So a frickin' flu was gonna take us down. Not walkers, not the Governor, a flu. I was pissed. We were too strong to go down that way. After Karen n' David, people were dyin' left n' right. Hershel wouldn't stay the hell away from the sick ones. He was gonna get himself killed. I worried more for Beth than for Hershel about this. How did he think his daughters were gonna' get along without him? Maggie wasn't takin' it well that he insisted on bein' in there. She was pretty pissed too.

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**

**1 Month Later. . .**

**Daryl:**

The Governor was back. The bastard had Hershel and Michonne n' he was fixin' to kill Hershel with Michonne's katana. I was ready to shoot him right then but he had too many people with him. They'd kill us off. Then he did kill Hershel, and it meant war. I could hear Beth n' Maggie screamin' and god. . . seein' Beth like that was killin' me. "I was tryin' to find the kids and get them on the bus."

I looked around. We were out of time. If we stayed any longer we were gonna die. I shook my head. "We gotta go Beth. We gotta go." She followed me as I took off runnin' toward the back fence. We jumped it and headed for the woods.


	3. 3

Beth:

I watched straight ahead of me: watched the wings on Daryl's back as we ran for our lives. I couldn't bring myself to think of anything but surviving right now and making it to tomorrow alive. We ran as long as we could, until we collapsed into the grass coughing and sputtering, gasping for breath. "Looks like it's 'bout four. We left the prison at half past one." Daryl spit out between gasps. "What? Two and a half hours?" I started to slow my breathing, calming down and resting a little. Daryl nodded, still struggling to breathe. How could we have run for two and a half hours without stopping? Just as I thought this, I started to feel completely exhausted. Adrenaline. That's what kept us running so long. But it was starting to wear off and I was crashing. I felt my eyes getting heavy and closing. Just as I drifted to sleep, a large, rough hand grabbed my arm and pulled me up. 

"Come on!" He pulled me forward, running again as I tried desperately to get my balance. "Daryl, why are we running again? Can't we just stop for a little while?" He glanced back at me, obviously a little annoyed. "Sure, if you're willin' ta die for that. Look behind us." I half-turned around, gasping at what I saw. I couldn't see the end of the herd. "Where the hell did they come from?" I questioned. "Don' know. But we gotta' keep runnin'." I nodded, though I knew he couldn't see and didn't really have time to look back and watch for my reaction. I looked back again. Believe it or not, they were gaining on us. . . fast. I glanced to the right. Nothing. Then back to the left. Four walkers were right next to us, heading our way. 

Daryl:

We were runnin' pretty fast. I felt Beth gasp and stop, pullin' me back a bit. I grunted. "What the hell, girl? Why'd you stop?" I turned around and saw Beth pulling her knife out of a walker's face, its hand still wrapped around her ponytail. She rushed to pull her hair out of its hand and turned to face me. "Go. I'm okay. Go!" So we ran again. When my foot hit somethin' hard it echoed. I looked down at my feet and gaped at what was under my foot. "It's a bunker. Beth, get inside." I yanked open the door and jumped down into the dark, metal box. "C'mon!" I held out my arms to catch her and nodded. She jumped down and I caught her around the waist and put her down. My hands tingled from her body heat. I looked down at them. "Daryl? You okay?" I shook my hands and nodded, then realized the door to the bunker was still open. I leapt up and grabbed the handle just as a walker got to it and lunged at my wrist. It missed and fell halfway into the door, causing me to slam the door on its head, dumping black blood all over me. "Ugh. Great." Beth was already exploring with the flashlight, looking for anything we could use. She walked over and handed me a pillowcase, which she'd dunked in a barrel of water sittin' by the other wall. 

I wiped at my face and arms as I had a better look around. "Somebody was gettin' ready for somethin' like this to happen." Beth looked at me wide-eyed. "Do you think they knew this was gonna happen?" I shook my head. "Doubt it. Did you ever watch TV before this all went down?" She nodded. "Why?" "Did ya ever see that show where they round up all those people who were preparin' for all kinds a disasters? They built bunkers like this, made cool new stuff to cook and boil water, built armored vehicles, and all sorts of other crazy stuff?" She shook her head. "I think I heard of something like that once though. It's good for us I guess, right?" I nodded. "Yeah. For now." 

Beth:

I kept searching the bunker for anything we could use, but I really didn't have to go far. Whoever it was that made the shelter never got to it when the apocalypse hit and the dead started to come back. Everything was still fully stocked. The shelves held rows and rows of canned food, bottled water, batteries, and medical supplies. There was a trunk in the corner that held sheets, more pillowcases, and a king-sized inflatable mattress and hand-pump. "We should stay." I looked at Daryl. "Why?" I was confused. Had he not seen the shelves and al the supplies that were still here? "Because, look around Daryl. Do you see all the stuff that's here? We could survive here for months withuot anyone finding us, and the walkers can't get to us in here." He obviously hadn't really looked yet because when I said this, he began to inspect the entire place top to bottom. "Damn, there's a lotta stuff here." I nodded. "Yeah, so? What'd you think?" He walked over to the door and looked up at it. "There's a lock on the inside of the door here. . . " He paused for a long time while he did a few last-minute inspections and decided. "Yeah. I think we should stay, at least until we can't anymore."

At that I set to blowing up the mattress. Daryl found a big box of clean clothes in the corner by the water barrel. He dug through it and found a t-shirt that was probably about 3 sizes too big, but it was all we had. I streched the sheets across the mattress as Daryl pulled off his shirt and vest and changed into the dark grey t-shirt. I watched him as he smirked, looking down at the shirt literally hanging off of him. "Roomy." His lips jerked into a small smile and he looked over at me. My eyes darted to the floor when they met his. He chuckled a little. "What? Don't ya like my dress?" We both cracked up at this. By the time we stopped laughing I had the bed made. I wondered what time it was. Probably late because I was getting seriously tired. Daryl could obviously see this on my face. "C'mon." He sat down on the bed and motioned for me to do the same. I did, rolling over so my back was against his, covering myself with a blanket. Right away I felt my eyes getting heavier and the room getting darker.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I woke to Daryl having rolled over almost completely on top of me. I was lying on my face with him on my back. Holy crap I must've been tired to not wake up when he rolled over. I had to admit, though, it wasn't entirely unbearable. I almost kinda. . . no, no way. I made a mental note to shut my thoughts the hell up and tried to go back to sleep. . . unsuccessfully. So I slid myself out from under him, half waking him up in the process, and walked over to the bin of clothes.

I grabbed a wash cloth out and dipped it in the water barrel, wiping it across my face, arms, and legs. I made my way back to the clothes. I dug through the man's t-shirts and jeans, coming to a few piles of juniors' clothing. The man must've had a daughter about my age. . . and size. . . jackpot. I pulled out a pair of dark skinny jeans, a green tank top (a little short for me), and a light grey hoodie. I left the hoodie unzipped for now, it wasn't that cold, but it was a little chilly in there. I found a hair brush in the drawer in the tiny bathroom behind the water barrel. I looked in the mirror and brushed my hair into a much neater pony tail. When Daryl woke up we would have to decide what the plans for the day were.


	4. 4. You'll Come Back From This

Daryl:

My hands tingled as I held on to her hips. Her face turned pink as I held her tighter and tighter. "Hey. . . Hey. . ." I started shaking. "Daryl, hey. Wake up. Wake up"

I opened my eyes and Beth was sittin' on the floor next ta me. "Hey." I sat up on the mattress. I felt a breeze, looking down to see my bare chest. Somehow I'd managed to rip off the t-shirt during the night. Couldn'ta been that hard ta get it off bein' it was so huge on me. Beth saw it too and sat there starin' at me? "Wha'?" Her eyes darted to the ground and she turned all shades a red. She mumbled an apology and I nodded, walkin over to the wash-barrel (water barrel) with my shirt and vest. I dunked em in the water and scrubbed em out as best I could. Then I rang em out and hung em over the backside of a chair by the bed. 

"So what's the plan?" I turned around to face 'er. "What plan?" She shook her head. "I don't know, the plan for the day? Whatr'e we gonna do today?" I looked around. All I saw was what was left of the walker that was all over my clothes by the time we'd gotten in here. He was startin' to reek pretty bad. I jerked my head toward the pile of black crud on the floor under the door. "Recken we outta get him outta here. He's startin' to smell." Beth covered her nose with her shirt and giggled. "Starting to?" I couldn't help but smile a little."Okay. . . He already smells real nasty." She dropped her shirt and walked over to the box of clothes. She grabbed a couple rags and slid the box out to reveal a shovel. I walked over and grabbed the shovel, while she dunked the rags in the water and followed me back over to where the door was.

I reached up and unlocked the door, pushing it up. It was heavier than it felt yesterday. It must have been the adrenaline. As I stepped onto the first rung of the ladder, I heard that familiar gurgling growl and walkers startin pourin' into the small bunker two at a time. The herd hadn't passed yet. "Daryl! What are we gonna do?!?!" I hear Beth yell as she shoves her knife into a stringy haired walkers skull. Another grabs her from behind and yanks her to the ground.

Beth:

I hit the ground. . . hard, with a walker on top of me. I felt something warm and wet start to run down the back of my head and stick in my hair as I struggled to hold the walker above me. The room was beginning to go dark and there were probably fifteen walkers in the tiny little bunker, all coming at me, and more piling in by the second. I could hear the walker's yellow, rotting teeth smashing together as it got closer to my face. Another was just about to me when the first went limp and fell down on top of me. "We need ta hide in the bathroom." Was the last thing I heard before I blacked out. 

Daryl:

Beth was out cold, but I wan't sure why. I picked her up bridal style and carried her with me to the puny little bathroom. When we got inside I could get a better look and see what was wrong with her. These people had the bunker rigged up with generators, so the lights worked. But as I put my hand on the back of her head to set her down, I didn't even have to look to know she was bleeding. . . and bad. I grabbed my flashlight out of my back pocket ta get an even better look and moved her hair, shining the light on the back of her head. Shit! She hit her head hard. She had a gash on the back of her head probly bout an inch and a half long and a quarter inch wide, just pourin' blood outta it. 

"Aw Beth, no." Just then the door started to rattle as walkers started bangin' on it, tryin' to break in and gut us alive. "Shit!" I yelled and sat her back against the wall, sitting down next to her and holdin' the door shut with my feet. The room was almost smaller than the bathroom in Dale's old RV. I reached over to the cabinets by my right leg and opened it. I grabbed a small towel out and pressed it to the back of Beth's head. Her blood soaked through the towel in probly no more than ten minutes. She was bleedin' out. I pressed a second towel to her head, this time harder. It didn't soak through as quickly this time and eventually she was barely bleeding at all but her face was a sickly greyish color. 

I knew we were pretty much screwed, but I kept lookin' for anything that could help us anyway. I found a sewing kit in one of the drawers, why a sewing kit in the bathroom? I couldn't figure it out but I didn't care. I had to try to stich her up. So I did. I pulled out my lighter and burned the needle clean. Then I layed Beth across my lap and threaded the needle. I had never sewn before, but I had an idea how it should probably work. I took a deep breath as I stuck the needle through Beth's skin. She didn't even move. Oh god, no. I was panicking, but I kept going. I bit off the thread and looked down at what I'd done. Not too bad, it shoud do what it needed to. When I opened the cabinet back up for another towel, I noticed a weird lookin' panel at the back. 

I tried pushin' on the panel and it gave right away. It was a tunnel. I readjusted myself so my back was against the door, and reached over to Beth, pulling her over to me. I crawled into the tunnel and pulled Beth in behind me, pushing the panel back into place, my crossbow still flung across my back the whole time. To my surprise, the tunnel opened up right away. It was big enough now for me to scoot backwards with Beth in my lap. I made my way through the tunnel whispering in Beth's ear. "You'll come back from this. You'll come back from this. Don't worry. I promise you'll come back from this." 

My back finally hit another wall where I turned to the right and kept going. Beth stirred a little and started to wake up, but she never opened her eyes. "Ugh. . . ugmmmm. . . " And then she was silent again. I went back to whispering to her. We'd been in the tunnel 'round an hour when I passed through a door and we tumbled out onto the floor in a different room. Sunlight blinded me as I realized we were in a glass room. . . no, plexiglass, so the walkers couldn't break through. I looked around the room and spotted a house 'bout a football field away. Bet they owned this bunker. Walkers dotted the ground everywhere. I made the choice to take our chances. 

I looked around the room. What? No more tunnels? Ugh. I picked Beth up off the floor and made sure she was alive before silently pulling open the door and taking off toward the house, walkers hot on my tail. I hit the front porch flyin', almost face-planting with Beth held to my chest. But I caught myself and beat on the door. No answer. So I kicked in the door and bolted inside, shutting the door behind me. It took me a few minutes to calm down and turn around after barricading the door, to notice the family of four sitting on the couch, silently watching me with gaping mouths and wide eyes. 

That's when I lost it. I broke. I fell to my knees, still clinging to Beth. "Help her. . . please." It came out as just a quiet whisper. "She's dying." A large man stood up and walked over to us, holding out his hand. "I'm Dr. Andrew James, but you can call me Andy. My family and I will do everything we can to help your friend." I looked up at him, tears soaking my face. "Thank you."

Andy stood and motioned for me to follow him. I stood, holding Beth and followed him into the bedroom, where, instead of a bed, stood an operating table, a powerful lamp, and pretty much everything a hospital would have in an OR. He motioned to the table, and I laid Beth on her stomach, exposing the half-hazard stitches I'd put in a few hours before. 

Andy flipped a switch and machines all over the room whirred to life. "How'd you get all this stuff?" Andy didn't seemed bothered by the question, just kept workin'. I was a private-practice doctor. Mostly minor surgeries though. This is where I worked." I nodded and he continued. "Did you stitch this up?" "Uh. . . yeah. I was tryin' ta close it till we found help. It came sooner than I thought it would." He nodded slowly. It did its job. Good thinkin'." I nodded. "Thank you, sir." He slowly took out the thread and replaced it with dissoluble stitching. I helped him roll her back over and carry her to a spare bedroom and lay her down on the bed. He turned to leave. "I'll be right back." He came back a few minutes later with an IV bag and a bag of blood. "She's lost a lot of blood. She needs more and some fluids. These should take care of it." He attached them to a metal hook by the bed and stuck the long needle into the back of Beth's hand for the fluids, and another into the inside of her arm for the blood. "She should wake up when the fluids take hold." I looked up. "Are you sayin' she'll be okay?" He shook his head. "I'm sayin' she might be. We'll have to wait and find out. You wanna come out to the living room and meet the rest of the family?" I shook my head. "I don't wanna leave her. I'll introduce myself when she wakes up." He looked at me sadly. If she wakes up." I shook my head. "No, she will. She's strong. She'll come back from this."

With that Andy nodded and went to the living room to be with his family. I stayed by Beth all night and into the next day. I wouldn't leave her side until she woke up. I wanted to be the first thing she saw when she did. And she would wake up. I knew it. She had to wake up. I needed her.


	5. Mornin'

{Daryl:}

I slept in a chair by the bed where Beth was lying. It had been a day and a half and Beth still hadn't woken up. I only left once to use the bathroom. I knew Beth was getting better because the color was coming back to her face by the hour. I put my hand on her forehead and rubbed the loose hair back there with my thumb. I looked down and dropped my hand. She would get better, I knew it. She already was, but even though she was right in front of me I was dying inside without her. I felt completely alone even with her right there and four other conscious people in the next room. I crossed my arms on the side of the bed and laid my head down, letting sleep overtake me.

I jerked awake when I heard gasping and felt the bed shaking like crazy. I looked up to see Beth, panicking and pulling at the IV's in her arm. "Beth! Beth, calm down. You're okay. You're okay." She saw me and sat back. "What happened? How long was I out?" I smiled at her, glad to see she was alright. She slid over and wrapped her arms around my neck, catching me off guard. I put my arms around her as she buried her face in my neck. I could feel her tears starting to soak through my shirt. "A walker pulled you down. You hit your head. . . hard. I thought I lost you." She squeezed my neck tighter. "You didn't. I'm still here." She pulled away from me. "Where is here? And how did we get here?" So I told here we were in the James' house, and that I'd dragged here through the tunnels in the bunker. She was silent for a long time, thinkin'. "How long ago?" I looked down. "You've been out for almost two days. Your skin was grey, you lost so much blood." She smiled at me, tryin' ta let me know that she really was okay. I forced a smile back. She hugged me again and I couldn't help grinning.

{Beth:}

Had I really been unconscious for almost two days? Soon, four people came into the room. There was a middle aged man and woman, a boy probably about eleven years old, and a brown-haired girl about my age. I smiled at them. "Hi!" The woman stepped toward the bed and put her hand on my shoulder. "I'm Evelyn, and this is my husband, Andrew." She then turned and hugged Daryl, who nodded and whispered a thank you in her ear. She smiled at him and walked back over by Andrew. The boy stayed where he was and introduced himself. "I'm Noah." I nodded to him and the girl came over. "Hi there! I'm Aleigha, but most people just call me Leigh." She beamed at me from ear to ear then hugged me. "I'm Beth. And, I'm guessing he didn't introduce himself yet." I said, nodding to Daryl. "That's Daryl." She looked over at him. "Nice to meet you, Daryl." He grunted and nodded, tugging the corners of his mouth into a barely visible smile. Then Leigh turned back to me, examining the back of my head. "If you want, I can teach you how to hide that." I put my hand up to the back of my head, wincing, and noticed that the area around the cut had been shaved. Leigh laughed at the look on my face, and explained. "Daddy had to shave that spot to sew it up. But, don't worry, I know how to disguise it. I had brain surgery a few years before the dead started walking around, so part of my head was shaved too." I smiled and nodded. "That sounds great." Andrew cleared his throat and I looked up at him. "How're ya feelin'?" I laughed. "Like I really wanna get up and walk around." He nodded and took the needles out of my arm, taping a gauze pad to each spot. He turned to look at Daryl. "You might wanna walk with her, she'll probably be unsteady, she's most likely still pretty weak." Daryl nodded and walked over, sliding an arm under mine and around my back.

"Hey, my clothes would probably fit you. You wanna go upstairs to my room and change out of those? The whole back of that sweatshirt is covered in blood." I nodded and Daryl helped me up off the bed and my knees immediately buckled under me. With Daryl's help, I regained my balance and we followed Leigh upstairs. . . slowly. I tripped a few times, but Daryl was always there to catch me. When we got to Leigh's room, she pulled out a purple sweater, a pair of gray leggings, and a black stocking cap. "Winter's almost here." She said, holding them out to me. I hadn't even realized how cold it had gotten outside since the attack on the prison, and it had only been a few days! "Thank you." Daryl helped me to the bathroom and Leigh helped me change. She brought me back to her room and I sat down on the bed. "Okay. So here's what we can do with your hair." She brought out a hairbrush, a small gauze pad, and a few hair ties. She gently put the gauze pad over my stitches and put a small strip of cloth tape over it. "This will protect your cut." Then she gently brushed my hair back into a ponytail, and braided it, wrapping the braid around the hair tie into a bun and stretching another hair tie over the bun. "Ta-da! All done!" She brought me a hand-held mirror and I checked out my hair. "I love it! Thank you!" I hugged her. I almost couldn't believe how nice these people were with the world being the way it was. She grinned from ear to ear, inspecting her work.

We had been in Leigh's room talking and laughing for almost an hour, Daryl just looking uncomfortable, when Evelyn called us for dinner. We talked and ate, and everything seemed. . . normal for a while, but the normalcy ended with shattering glass as a window was smashed in the bedroom where I had been sleeping.

{Daryl:}

I ran to the bedroom and slammed the door shut as walkers started to climb through the window by the bed. I yelled to the family to grab what they needed or could get to and quick while I barricaded the door with a china cabinet from next to the front door. Andy ran to the OR-like room and filled a duffel bag with medication, bandages, and gauze. Leigh and Noah ran upstairs, and Evelyn went to the kitchen and got a bag of food and water bottles. We regrouped in the living room and ran for the door, just as the china cabinet went crashing to the ground and walkers swarmed the living room.


	6. Chapter 6

{Daryl:}

"Daryl!" I spun around to see Beth struggling out the door. She was still weak. I ran to her and scooped her up, running with her in my arms, bridal style. She watched over my shoulder, making sure the others were following us safely. The herd was bigger than when we got to the house a few days before. I heard Beth gasp. "Yeah. It was about half this size when we got to the house." "Wow. I sure missed a lot." I couldn't help but barely smile, but I had to focus on running. I glanced back to see Aleigha take out a couple of walkers, and Noah runnin' by his mom, almost attached to her hip.

{Beth:}

Even though I was watching them follow us, I heard the scream before I saw where it came from. I glanced from person to person until I landed on Evelyn. She was being pulled backward by a female walker, her shoulder in its mouth. Noah stopped, screaming for his mom, and causing all of the walkers around us that weren't already after us to turn and lunge toward us. Evelyn saw this too. "Run! Noah, honey, RUN!!!" Noah, tears streaming down his face, shook his head furiously. "No! Mom!" Leigh turned and ran to her little brother, scooping him up in her arms and bolting back to catch up with us. When we got farther away from where Evelyn was killed, Leigh put Noah down, grabbed his hand, and pulled him along as we ran. I did my best to hold back tears, wrapping my arms around Daryl's neck and laying my head down on his shoulder, squeezing my eyes shut.

{Daryl:}

The herd was gettin' thinner as we went along. Beth's eyes were shut and she was leanin' on my shoulder. "You alright?" She opened her eyes. "Mhm. I'm fine. You?" I smirked. "Sure." She forced a smile and laid her head back on my shoulder. "How much farther do you think we have to go?" I replied between breaths. "Not much. Herd's thinnin' out." She nodded. The cold was bitin' at me and that was when I realized that all I had on was my vest, jeans, and shoes. The metal of my crossbow stung my shoulder as I ran, but Beth's body heat kept the front of me warm. After about an hour of runnin', I saw a town just ahead of us. When we got there, we ran for the stores, lookin' for supplies. We were a good way ahead of the herd, so we had about fifteen minutes at most. Leigh found a couple blankets and a big tent, and Beth and I found a shirt for me, then went out into the parking lots to find a car. There was a blue van parked by the department store, keys still inside. "Sweet! Alright Beth, guess this is our new ride." She giggled as I set her in the passenger seat, walking around the front to the driver's seat. I put it in gear and we drove over a few lots to the other stores and picked up Leigh, Noah, and Andy. "Hop in!" I looked over where the herd would be comin' from. The first walkers were hittin' the parkin' lots. "And hurry. We gotta go!" Andy slid the door open and quickly pushed the kids inside, following them and slamming the door shut. "Alright. Let's go."

{Beth:}

We pulled out of the parking lot right before the walkers made it to the buildings. I looked over at Daryl. "So where do we go?" He shrugged his shoulders and shook his head, in that cute way of his where he just randomly shakes his head in whatever direction, not up and down or right and left, just all over. I smiled and blushed. Was I really feeling this way? Daryl Dixon of all people? Then he spoke. "Higher I guess. And away from the city." I nodded. There'd be fewer walkers there so it was our best bet. And Daryl knew what he was doing.

I yawned and felt my eyelids getting heavy. "Go to sleep. You're still recovering. You need your rest." I felt my cheeks getting hot as my face got red again, so I flung my hands up to cover my face. Daryl looked over with a raised eyebrow and smiled at me. I smiled back and leaned my head back and to the side, looking out the window and falling asleep.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When I woke up, we weren't in the van anymore. We were in the tent from the stores. Daryl was asleep to my right, sharing a blanket with me, while Leigh slept to my left, sharing with Noah. I could see Andy's shadow outside while he stood watch. I smiled, feeling safe next to Daryl, and scooted just barely closer to him. I closed my eyes and tried to get back to sleep. I slept for a little while, only to be woken by Daryl sitting up and leaving the tent. A few minutes later Andy came back inside and lay down by Leigh. Suddenly my right arm felt cold. I couldn't fall back asleep so I unzipped the tent and stepped outside, closing the flap behind me. "Hey." Daryl jumped a little then looked at me. "Shouldn't ya be sleepin'? You're weak still." I shrugged, folding my arms around myself. "I couldn't sleep. My head's throbbing." I laughed and he smiled. "So where are we anyway?" He looked up at the stars. "Somewhere in the mountains. Ain't likely any walkers gon' make it up here, but we just wanna be sure, ya know?" I nodded, looking at him. "Yeah. I know." A gust of wind hit us and I shivered. Daryl moved closer to me, putting an arm around my shoulders. "Hey. If you're gonna be out here, at least go get the blanket." I nodded sharply, the stitches under my hair pulling and stinging a little. I opened the flap back up, grabbed the blanket from the floor of the tent, and closed the flap behind me as I crawled back outside. I walked back over to Daryl, unsteadily, and threw on side of the blanket around his shoulders. He wrapped an arm around me and pulled me into his side. I blushed and put my arms around his waist, holding the blanket corner in one hand, and rested my head on his shoulder.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Hey." I jerked awake. Somehow Daryl and I had ended up sitting on the ground, and I'd fallen asleep on him. I looked over to see Leigh coming out of the tent, looking at me. I smiled. "Hey." That's when I realized that I still had my head on Daryl's shoulder. My face turned bright red as I looked down, trying to hide my face. Leigh raised her eyebrows and smiled. "Wanna take a walk?" I nodded, unsure. "I'm still not quite steady on my feet, but it's getting better." She nodded. "I'll help you, don't worry." She held out her hand, and pulled me to my feet. Daryl held out his handgun. "Take this with ya. Just in case. . . And be careful." I moved toward him and stretched up to kiss his cheek. He stood motionless and quiet, but I could see his face start to get a little red. I smiled. "I will." He nodded, again with that all-over head shake. I was starting to get butterflies. . . but just a little. "You ready?" I turned to see Leigh, one eyebrow still raised. "Um. . . yeah. Let's go."


	7. Chapter 7

Beth:

Leigh and I walked for a few minutes, then she turned around like to see if someone was following us. When she decided that no one was she turned to me. "So what's up with you and the redneck?" I looked at her. Was I that easy to read? "Daryl?" She nodded. I looked up. "Oh, god I don't know." She pursed her lips as I looked back to her. "Do you like him?" I nodded. "Like-like?" Yes! I thought. But I didn't say that, of course. "I. . . I think so. But, he doesn't feel the same way, I'm sure." She stopped, stopping me with her. "Are you serious? Have you seen the way he looks at you when you're together? That man is obviously crazy about you!" And there I was, turning beet red again. I was really bad about that. "Okay. . . so. . . what do I do?" She just looked at me with a blank expression, which changed quickly to excitement. Was I going to have a best friend? "Make. A. Move! Duh!" I sighed. Maybe. "The age difference doesn't bother you?" She shrugged. "Who the hell cares anymore anyway. What's the difference in age between you two anyways?" I stayed quiet for a minute. "Well. . . I'm eighteen and he's thirty-five." She shrugged. "Seventeen years. I've seen much bigger gaps." My eyes widened. "Really? What's the biggest gap you've ever heard of?" She thought for a moment. "Forty-four years." I laughed. "What? No way!" She nodded with a smug look on her face. "Yes way!" "Where?" She giggled. "So, on TV, did you ever watch a show called 'Cougar Wives'?" I shook my head. "Well this one lady was like sixty-six and her husband was like twenty-two." Really? So Daryl and my age difference wasn't that bad. "Really?" "Yeah. If you ask me, he was a total gold-digger. This lady was loaded." I nodded. I couldn't believe I was having a teenager-like conversation in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. It felt good to be normal for at least a little while. My legs started to feel numb the farther we went. "Hey, can we turn around? My legs are starting to sorta give out on me." She nodded. "Sure." She turned us around and we walked back to camp.

Daryl jogged over to us and picked me up when we got back. "You alright?" I nodded. "Yeah. I'm okay. Just tired. I promise." He nodded and sat me down by the tent, sitting down next to me. "Where's Andy?" Daryl looked at me. "He took Noah and they went huntin'." I was surprised. Hunting was usually Daryl's thing. "Without you?" He nodded. "Said I needed to be here when you guys got back. So he wouldn't let me go. Honestly, I didn't really wanna go. I wanted to make sure you came back safely." Leigh went inside the tent and I assumed she went to sleep. I slid away from Daryl and lay down, my head on his right leg. He put his hand on my head and rubbed circles behind my ear with his thumb. I smiled and fell asleep after a while.

Daryl:

Beth was still asleep and Noah and Andy still hadn't gotten back when the first drop hit my face. It was gettin' cold and it was gonna storm. It was probably 'round November by now. Probly had been when we got to the James' house.

I slid my arms under Beth and lifted her off the ground, steppin' into the tent and puttin' her back down with her head sideways to miss her cut. I sat down next to her, pullin' a blanket over her as the air got colder. Her sleeve slid up a little and I ran my finger over the thick scars across her wrist. "Daryl." I hadn't noticed she'd woken up. She sounded almost sad. I looked at her. "That Beth is gone now. I replaced her with the me that's here now." That's all she had to say. I believed her. I looked back at her face and she smiled at me, tellin' me it was alright. I smiled back at her and slid my hand from her wrist into her palm. She closed her fingers and intertwined them with mine as I lay down next to her.

Beth:

I looked over at Leigh, who was hunched over at the other side of the tent. Her shoulders were shaking, small sobs escaping with her breath. I sat up, patting Daryl's wrist with my free hand and sliding my hand from his. I crawled over to Leigh. "Are you okay?" She shook her head and looked at me, her eyes red and her face puffy, tear streaks down the sides of her face. She didn't need to say anything. I knew it was about her mom. She'd been holding back her emotions since her mom died almost two days ago. "Leigh. . . " She looked up at me. "She didn't deserve to die like tha-" Her sentence was cut off by another fit of sobs that shook her whole body. I wrapped both arms around her shoulders, pulling her into me and holding her while she cried. She eventually cried herself to sleep, but I wasn't strong enough to lay her down without dropping her or waking her up. I looked back toward Daryl, who was looking back at me. I jerked my head a little toward Leigh and he got up onto his knees, crawling over to help me lay her down. When she was lying down and covered up, Daryl and I crawled back to our side of the tent. I couldn't help but wonder where Noah and Andy were and hope they were okay.

"What's up?" I looked over at Daryl, jumping from my thoughts. "Hm?" He sat up onto one elbow. "You're thinkin' 'bout somethin'. What's wrong?" I closed my eyes and squeezed them shut, sighing. "Andy and Noah aren't back yet." "They'll be okay. It's just takin' em a while, that's all." I opened my eyes back up and looked him in the eyes. "Okay." Before I knew what was happening, I had closed the gap between us and my lips were on his. He didn't pull away, he just stayed there for a minute. I smiled through the kiss as he started to kiss me back hesitantly, and not long after he got bolder, kissing back a little harder. When he pulled away he looked down at the ground and grinned from ear to ear. It wasn't the kind of smile I was used to seeing him make, and it was an amazing change. When he looked back up at me I grinned at him and pressed my lips to his again.

Daryl:

When Beth's lips hit mine I froze. When I realized what she was doin' I wasn't afraid anymore to tell her how I felt and I was glad I didn't have to say anythin'. I told her by kissin' her back. I rolled over onto my back and tried to sleep, knowin' I wouldn't.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And I didn't.

Beth:

I opened my eyes, sitting up, getting to my feet, and stepping outside the tent. Daryl followed me out. "Still no Andy or Noah." It had been two days since they left. I looked at Daryl and he read into my expression, putting his hand on my shoulder. I looked up at him then down to my feet. Just then, the bushes by our camp started to rustle. Daryl loaded his crossbow, lifting it quickly as Leigh came barreling out of the tent. "Wha-" I put a finger to my lips, signaling for her to be quiet, and pointed at the bushes. She nodded and covered her mouth. I put my hand on Daryl's back, more for my own comfort than for his. He wasn't afraid and I knew that. But I was, and so was Leigh.

We stood there for what seemed like hours but couldn't have been more than five minutes, waiting for something to happen. My heart was racing, my other hand on my chest as if I could slow it down. The rustling got closer and Daryl tensed up a little, while I was rigid, frozen in place. Finally the rustling was right at the edge of the bushes. Even though I was scared to death of what could come out of the bush, I wasn't quite ready for what I saw.


	8. Chapter 8

{ } = flashback

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Beth:

I stood, still frozen as Glenn and Maggie stumbled out of the bush. "Oh my God!!! Maggie!" I stumbled trying to run up to her, eventually getting there and throwing my arms around her, apparently before she realized who it was, because she stood there for a minute thinking, and when she registered where she was and who she was with, she burst into tears and I did the same. Daryl walked up to Glenn, pulling him into a hug (honestly kinda out of the ordinary for Daryl but I didn't mind), and introducing him to Leigh and explaining the Noah and Andy situation to him. I hugged Glenn and asked him to explain what Daryl told him to Maggie, and he nodded. I was so happy to have my sister back again and I was going to make sure I didn't lose her again.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[The next day. . . about 9:30pm]

Daryl:

I took watch again and Beth insisted on goin' out with me again. She was gettin' better and stronger by the day. {It took at least an hour for the story to sink in for Maggie. She cried, especially when Beth took her hair out and showed Maggie the stitches and shaved spot on the back of her head.}

Beth walked over to me, a blanket around her shoulders, her hair still down, showin' the healin' gash on the back of her head. I cringed lookin' at it and thinkin' back to the day it happened, and dragging Beth through the tunnels in my lap. I shook my head, tryin' to get the image outta my head. Beth leaned into me and I wrapped my arm around her shoulders, kissin' the top of her head. She looked at me and stretched up on her toes to kiss my lips. "Oooh! I see you've made a move!" Beth rolled her eyes, turnin' and raisin' an eyebrow at Leigh. "You and the redneck. I knew it." She grinned. I laughed as Daryl chimed in. "Yeah? And how'd you know that?" She smirked. "Are you kidding? You guys made it pretty obvious." Beth blushed next to my shoulder and I smiled down at her. We were gonna be okay. . . for now.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[6 months later. . . ]

Maggie:

I had overheard Leigh, Beth, and Daryl talking about his and Beth's relationship (if that's what you wanna call it) from inside the tent six months ago. I confronted Beth about it the next day and she told me everything. I playfully scolded her for not tellin' me first thing when Glenn and I found them, but I was really very happy for her. Daryl was a good man: loyal, respectful, protective. He'd take good care of her even after I was gone. We all knew Daryl would most likely outlive us all. Against all odds we had made it six months in the woods, in a tent. Beth and Daryl's friends Andy and Noah never came back though.

We made the decision to look for a more permanent place to stay without leaving the mountains because walkers weren't able to get up here as easily unless they died up here.

Beth:

I walked alongside Maggie, chatting about all the things I'd gone through in the few days since the prison attack. For the most part, she just nodded, asking a question or two along the way. She turned around and walked backwards, facing me. "So you and Daryl. . . How's it goin' for you two?" I blushed. "Good. I guess." I giggled when she raised her eyebrows at me. She nodded, smiling. "Good. You seem happy, so I'm happy for you." I hugged her. She gave me a little shove towards Daryl. "Now go see your man." I grinned and let out a laugh. "Okay." I walked up to Daryl and he slid his free arm around my" waist, resting his hand on my hip. "Hey." I grinned up at him. "Hey." He looked at the back of my head. My hair had grown back in, but it was a lot shorter in the middle of the back than everywhere else. "Your hair's back." I put my hand over it. "Yeah but it's uneven." He took his hand off my hip and moved my hand away from my head. "It's beautiful." I smiled lightly. "Thanks. But maybe Maggie can help me find something to cut the rest of it with to even it out." He nodded, wrapping his hand around mine and intertwining our fingers. We walked in silence for a while until we stopped for the night.

Daryl:

"I think we're gettin' close to somewhere we can stay. We gotta be." I looked over at Beth, who was layin' on the ground beside me. "I hope so. It'll be nice not to sleep on the ground for a while." She rolled over and kissed me. I grabbed her hips and pulled her onto me. I pulled away from the kiss for air. "It will be nice." I went right back to kissin' her as she smiled through it. She pulled away and laid her head down on my chest. When her breathin' evened out I craned my neck to see her face. She was asleep. I turned her sideways and picked her up, getting onto my feet and carrying her into the tent.

Beth:

I woke up with a blanket over me and Daryl beside me. I figured that he'd probably moved me in here after I fell asleep last night. He was the sleeping one this time. I looked up at the little screen at the top of the tent. There wasn't any light shining through so it must have been early. I kissed Daryl lightly on the forehead without waking him and stepped outside. To my surprise, I wasn't the only one up. Maggie was already outside. "Hey." I walked over to her, sitting down on the ground beside her. "Why are you up so early?" She looked at me calmly. "Couldn't sleep. You?" I shook my head, smiling. "I've slept too long already, I'm awake now. Besides sometimes it's hard to sleep these days." She looked up at the sky and nodded. I cleared my throat. "But since you're up already, do you think you could help me with this situation?" I grabbed my hair and held part of it up. "It's kinda uneven." She laughed. "Sure. Come here." She picked up a rock and pulled out her knife, running the blade across the stone, sharpening it. She pulled all of my hair into a bunch and ran the knife through it, cutting it even. "There. All even." I smiled, reaching back to touch my now shoulder-length hair. I laughed to myself, knowing the change would surprise Daryl, even though I said something about having Maggie cut it. "Beautiful." She cupped the side of my face, along my jaw. I smiled and hugged her. Even though it had only been a few days between the attack on the prison and Maggie and Glenn finding us, I had missed my sister more than I had ever thought I could.

Later in the morning, dawn to be exact, we packed up the tent and the blankets and headed out to find sturdier shelter. I walked with Maggie and Leigh, while Daryl and Glenn led the way. Daryl wasn't kidding when he said we should be getting close, because after about two hours of walking, I saw something. "Hey! Daryl! Glenn!" They stopped along with everyone else as I pointed to a huge brick building on the edge of the mountain. "Nice!" Glenn gave me a high-five as we took off toward the building.

Daryl:

I stared at the faded sign above the door: S & J Hotel. The word "Hotel" had been crossed out and replaced with the word "Safehouse." I turned back to the group. "Somebody's here. Or was here. We gotta be caref-" I was interrupted by an arm around my chest and a knife to my throat. The look on Beth's face was pure terror, just like the rest of our little group. "What do you want?" The man's breath was right up against my ear. Glenn stepped forward. We're just out looking for a safer place to stay. Are there a lot of people here with you?" I could feel the man shake his head against the side of mine. "They're all dead." I elbowed him in the gut, tryin' to get away, but stopped when I felt a cold, sharp, pain in my neck and felt blood start to run down. Beth was wimperin', tears in her eyes. I tried to smile at her to let her know it would be alright, and I noticed that Leigh wasn't with the rest of the group anymore. I looked at Maggie and she glanced around, shruggin' her shoulders. I struggled again and the man's knife went a little deeper. I grunted from the pain and decided that tryin' to get away wasn't my best option. "How about this. You guys can walk away safely, and. . . I'll take that one inside with me." He raised the hand with the knife toward Beth and I used this as my opportunity. I elbowed him again. . . hard, sendin' him backward, but not before he lashed out with the knife and gave me a nice gash across my chest. BAM! I looked down. Only thing I saw was the blood seeping through my shirt from the gash and running down from my neck. I looked around and saw the man that'd been holdin' me layin' on the ground in a pile, dead. I let out of a sigh of relief. Leigh stood behind him, gun still raised.

Beth:

I raced over to Daryl, putting my hands over the cut on his neck and pushing down, trying to stop the bleeding. Daryl winced and picked me up, burying his face in my neck. "I'm okay. I'm okay. Let's go see what's inside." I nodded and he put down, jerking his head toward the house and walking toward it. I followed close behind with my hand on my knife, ready for just about anything. Daryl kicked the door in and there was nothing inside the front room. We cleared every floor except the last, finding no walkers, and no people. So we headed for the top floor, expecting the same. Glenn pushed open every door in the hallway. . . nothing. We reached the last door and Glenn opened it, gasping and slamming it shut again. "It's full of walkers!" Leigh had been quiet since killing the man who cut Daryl, until now. "Guess we found the guy's group." Daryl nodded. "Lets block off this floor. The rest of the building's clear. We can fortify that and stay here."

Maggie went back outside to get our stuff. I followed her out to help her, finding her standing over the man's dead body with a bloody knife in her hand. "Did he turn?" I ran over to her and she nodded. "Help me drop him over the side of the mountain." I grabbed his feet and she slid her arms up underneath his shoulders. We struggled with the man's weight over to the cliff's edge, throwing him over the side. We watched his body bounce over the rocks on the side of the mountain, breaking and bleeding. I smiled, morbid as it was. He was gonna kill Daryl. I felt the anger slowly leave my body as he flew through the air after hitting a ledge and bouncing off.

I shook my head and went back to Daryl to take care of his cuts. When I found him he was doubled over on his knees, the cut on his neck still bleeding, but not as much. "Daryl!" I ran and dropped to the ground next to him. I looked around and saw Glenn working on boarding up the windows with some lumber he'd found out back. "Glenn! Help me get Daryl inside!" Glenn hadn't seen Daryl fall. He turned around and his eyes went wide as he sprinted over, wrapping an arm around Daryl's waist and putting Daryl's across his back as I did the same. We stood him up and helped him to the house, half carrying him. I yelled for Leigh to grab the bag of medical supplies her dad had taken from the house. She snatched it up and followed us. Glenn and I laid Daryl down on the counter in the lobby, taking off his vest and unbuttoning his shirt to expose the wounds. His entire chest and stomach was covered in dried blood. I had to clean it off before I could see which wound needed attention first. Daryl was still conscious, against all odds, and groaned as I ripped a strip off my shirt and soaked it with water, wiping across his body, and gently over the cuts on his chest and neck.

Both wounds had stopped bleeding for the most part by now, but the one on his chest still oozed a little blood. The cut on his neck wasn't too deep or long, but the neck was never a fun place to have a cut anyways. Leigh held the bag of med supplies open for me and I fished around, finding rubbing alcohol, cotton balls, and some bandages for the time being. I used the alcohol to clean the cut on his neck. He cried out but stayed still. I put my free hand on his forehead and brushed his hair back. "It's gonna be okay. I'm gonna take care of you just like you take care of me every day." He did his best to smile at me and I smiled back, placing a kiss on his forehead. I moved next to the gash across his chest, which was deeper and longer. It was about eight inches long and a quarter-inch deep, leaving me surprised that it had stopped bleeding so quickly. Either way, I'd need to stitch it up. So I went back to digging in the bag as Maggie came flying into the room. Glenn had gone and gotten her. "Maggie! Can you sew this up? Daddy taught you more about this than me." She nodded as I found the supplies for it. I moved over by Daryl's head as Maggie rinsed her hands with alcohol like I had done and threaded the needle. I held Daryl's hand in mine as Maggie stuck the needle through one side of the gash. Daryl flinched and grunted, but fell silent again, squeezing his eyes shut. When Maggie finished, Daryl let out his breath, that it seemed like he'd been holding forever. "I think you'll be okay, Daryl." I looked from Maggie back down to Daryl who was sweaty and bloody. I leaned down close to his face. "You'll be okay." He raised his head a little and kissed me. "I know. 'Cause you're here. You're all here." I smiled and tears started to fall down my face, which he reached up and wiped with his thumb, caressing my cheek with his palm.

An hour and a half later, Daryl decided he wanted to get up. He forced himself into a sitting position and slid off the counter, walking outside with me following.


	9. Clear

Glenn:

I watched Daryl stumble out the door, obviously exhausted from blood loss and trying not to show how much pain he was in for Beth. He really cared about her and it showed. And she showed the same feelings for him, following him out the door to make sure he didn't overdo it. But if I knew Daryl I should have known that the first thing he would do is come over and try to help with the windows. "Come on." I shook my head. "You've gotta rest, man. You just had your chest and neck sliced open and closed within the same hour and a half. You gotta take it easy." Daryl grunted and walked back to Beth. "Won't let me help him." Beth kissed him on the cheek. "You need to scale it back for at least a few days, Daryl. We can go look for food in the woods." She walked into the hotel, returning a few minutes later with a canvas bag from behind the counter in the lobby. "Let's go!" She grinned and they headed for the woods, hand in hand.

Beth:

"Here's something!" I knelt over the patch of wild carrots. I knew a lot about what different kinds of plants because. . . Daddy, taught me. I pulled all of them, about twenty, out of the ground before standing and dusting off. "Nice find." I smiled smugly. "Thanks. Your turn!" Daryl smiled and kept looking around, carrying his crossbow because he couldn't have the string rubbing up against his stitching for a while. We walked for about half an hour. "Hey." Daryl pointed up into one of the trees. I saw one of my favorite fruits hanging from the branches. "Apples! No way!" I could just barely reach the branches, and I pulled as many as I could get to off the tree. "This is great!" I hugged Daryl, careful to avoid his chest and neck. He responded by taking the bag from me, laying it down, and pushing me up against a tree, kissing my neck.

Leigh:

Daryl and Beth came back from the woods looking kind of . . . disheveled. Beth's hair was messed up, her clothes crooked, and Daryl didn't look much better, though he still didn't have a shirt on after having his first one cut open by a madman. I knew instantly what they'd been doing and so did Glenn because when I looked over at him he was laughing his little ass off. How could Daryl be doing. . . that. . . when his chest was just cleaned and stitched a few hours ago? Whatever. I laughed to myself and ran over to Beth taking out her ponytail and smoothing it back into a neater one, while she straightened her clothes out, and Daryl did the same, smoothing his hair down and straightening his vest. "You should get cleaned up before your sister sees you guys." Beth laughed and kissed Daryl, running to the hotel. "Okay. I will."

Beth:

I got inside and made a beeline for the bathroom in the first room I came to. I made sure that my hair was straightened out and my clothes too, and used my water bottle to rinse out my mouth. After that, I headed back out to find Maggie. I found her helping Glenn finish boarding up the last windows. When they finished, she turned around to see me. "Oh hey! I wanted to talk to you." I smiled. "What about?" She tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. "I think we should clear that room on the top floor. You never know, we could end up needing it sometime. So far this place has actually been safer than the prison, except that one guy. But he's gone now. We could do something with this place." I nodded. "I think you're right. It would make everyone feel better knowing that there's no way there are any walkers that could come bursting out of a room above them at any moment. I'll talk to Daryl." I turned to walk away but she stopped me. "Oh and Beth?" I turned back. "Yeah?" She blushed a little and looked down, then back at me. "I know what you and Daryl did." I blushed and looked down, covering my face with my hands. "How?" She elbowed my arm. "I saw Leigh cleaning you up. It's not that hard to guess." She laughed. "You're not mad?" She laughed harder. "Why would I be mad, Beth. You deserve a life too." I smiled and walked back to Daryl.

Daryl:

"Hey." I wrapped my arms around Beth's waist as she walked over and kissed her forehead. "Hey." She looked at me. "What's up?" She cleared her throat. "Maggie thinks we should clear out the room upstairs, you know, for peace of mind's sake? I kinda agree with her." I thought it over for a minute. It'd be nice not to have to worry 'bout walkers rainin' down off the stairs on us while we slept. We could kill 'em and throw 'em out the window then off the mountain. I nodded. "Okay. Let's go do it now." She looked down at my chest, lightly tracing next to the line there. "But. . ." I put my hand under her chin and made her look at me. "It'll be fine. Let's go get the others and get started." She closed her eyes. When she opened them again she nodded and took my hand. "Okay."

Beth:

We walked back to where I'd left Maggie, but she wasn't there. All of a sudden Something huge fell on my back, knocking me to the ground on my face. "Ow! Daryl what is this?" He looked at me, clearly shocked. "They started already. It's a walker." He leaned over, dragging the walker off of me and pulling me back to my feet. "We gotta get up there." He took off running toward the entrance with me on his heels. We got to the top where Maggie, Glenn, and Leigh looked like they had it pretty much handled. They would open the door, let one or two out, kill them and toss them out the window. "What the hell? You couldn't come get us?" Daryl was pissed. Not extremely pissed this time, but pissed just the same.

"We have it handl-" Maggie didn't quite finish her sentence when the rest of the walkers in the room busted the door off its hinges and flooded out. Daryl loaded his crossbow and shot one through the skull. "Yeah. Looks like you do." I stabbed as many as I could, leading them down the hall toward the window a little ways, when one grabbed me and pulled me down. I was careful not to hit my head this time and rolled over to see Andy's rotting face in mine. "Oh my god!" Leigh ran over to help me and saw her dad's body on top of me. "No. . . NO! Beth. . . I. . . I can't." I struggled to keep Andy's teeth and nails off of me. "That's okay. I understand. But please get someone who can! Quick!" Leigh ran off as Andy's face came closer and closer to mine. Just then he went limp on top of me, a bolt in his head. I tried to push his body off me but he was too heavy and I was gonna suffocate with him on top of my chest. "Help!" I kept squirming and Glenn rolled Andy off me. As I stood I saw another large walker shove Daryl down. Daryl struggled with the walker and finally killed it, but didn't get up.


	10. Chapter 10

Beth:

As it turned out, Noah was there too, and dead. I ran to Daryl, dropping to my knees. His face was contorted in pain, his hand over his chest. I called to Maggie. "He's bleeding again! A lot!" Blood spurted out between my fingers as I put my hands over his to put pressure on the wound. I took my hands off long enough to slide his vest off of him while Leigh ran downstairs for the med bag and Maggie rushed to my side. "A couple of the stitches popped out. But I don't know why it's bleeding this much! Keep pressure on it." Together we turned Daryl, laying him flat on the floor as Leigh came flying back up the stairs. Maggie tore a piece off her shirt and used it to apply pressure to Daryl's chest while soaking up some of the blood. Daryl gritted his teeth and stiffened his body up as Maggie re-stitched his chest and the bleeding slowed. "There we go." Maggie wiped her forehead with the back of her hand, leaving a smear of blood behind.

Glenn and Leigh Moved Daryl into one of the rooms and put him on the bed while Maggie and I started throwing bodies out the window. "God that was close." I nodded. "Why couldn't Leigh help you when that big walker was attacking you?" I looked down. "That was her dad. And the little boy was her little brother. They were the two that went hunting and didn't come back. They must've found this place and that lunatic that lived here. That man fixed my head after Daryl saved me." We decided to bury Andy and Noah because they were part of our group. "Where should we put the graveyard?" She stopped me and put her hand on my shoulder. "We'll figure that out in a little while. You should go sit with Daryl." I nodded, hugging her and resting my head on her shoulder, tears threatening to fall again. I turned around and dried my eyes before going in to see Daryl.

Daryl:

I felt a little better right away when I saw Beth walk into the room. I smiled at her as best I could. "How're you feeling?" I looked down at my bloody chest. "Sore. And gross, believe it or not." I let myself laugh a little, ignorin' how much it hurt because it made Beth smile. I patted the bed next to me for her to sit and she she did. "It's a good thing we got up here when we did today." She shook her head. "You almost died today. Twice, Daryl." I looked up. "And you didn't? Andy coulda' bit you or suffocated you." She kept her eyes trained on the bed under her and put her hands up to her face. "I can't believe they were here the whole time! If Andy'd let you go with them, you'd be dead too. As it is, that lunatic almost killed you." I wrapped my hand around hers when she put them back down. "I'm okay though." " That's what you said before you almost bled out for the second time today." I was quiet after that.

Maggie:

"One. Two. Three!" Glenn and I hurled the last body off the side of the mountain. I closed the gap between us, wrapping my arms around his waist and planting a kiss on his lips. "So I guess we're safe now, at least for tonight, right?" He nodded. "We should be good up here for a while." We walked over and sat down, letting our feet hang over the edge of the cliff. We stayed there until it got dark and I started to fall asleep. "Hey, hon. Let's go inside. It's been a long day for you." He got up and pulled me up beside him, picking me up and carrying me inside and all the way to the top floor where Daryl, Beth, and Leigh were all staying. We thought it would be safest to be closer to each other in case something happened. I hopped out of Glenn's arms to check on Beth and Daryl. Beth was asleep on Daryl's arm and he looked at me when I walked in. "Thank you." I smiled. "For what?" He shook his head. "For savin' my ass today. Twice." I shook my head. "You don't need to thank me. That's what family does for each other." He nodded and looked at Beth, smiling. I started to back out of the room. "I'll see you in the morning, Daryl. Try to rest. You need it." He nodded and I left for Leigh's room, where I found her also sleeping. Glenn came up beside me. "You've done so much today for everyone. You need to sleep. We're okay for tonight. C'mon." So I followed him to the room he'd picked out for us, where I fell asleep the minute my head hit the pillow.


	11. One Year

[One year later. . . ]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Maggie:

Everybody had been up for hours except Beth. It had been a year since we found the hotel and cleared it out. As a group we'd made the decision that if we made it to a year, we'd look to make arrangements for this to possibly be a permanent home. I thought of the plans for a garden as I walked up the stairs to Beth and Daryl's room to wake her up. I turned the knob and pushed open the door. Beth wasn't asleep but hunched over the trash can in the corner of the room. "How long have you been sick?" She wiped her mouth. "A few hours, why?" I walked over to her. "Are you . . . ?" Her mouth dropped open. "Uh. . . It's possible I guess. But I don't know. . . " I nodded, unsure what to do. I guessed we'd just have to wait to know for sure. "Have you talked to Daryl?" She shook her head slowly. "I haven't had the chance to. I've either been sleeping or doing this all morning. . . and I hadn't even thought about this being much more than the flu or something. I mean. . . It could probably be just the flu, right?" I shrugged. "Maybe. We'll have to wait to find out." She nodded. "God, Maggie now I'm kinda freaked out. Do I have to tell Daryl right now or can I wait until I'm sure?" I sat down on the bed and she sat next to me. "Talk to him whenever you feel ready. Give it some time if you need to." She nodded. "Okay." She hugged me. "I'm glad you're here, Maggie." I rubbed my hand up and down her back. "Me too."

I pulled away from the hug. "You feel like coming down and planting the garden with us? Daryl and Glenn found some fruits and vegetables in the woods that we can make starts out of." She widened her eyes in surprise and lit up. "Oh! It's been a year hasn't it!" I nodded and she said that she would come down with me and help us plant so I waited for her to rinse out her mouth and straighten her hair. We walked outside and Daryl's eyes lit up. He jogged over to us and fell into step with Beth. "Mornin' Sleepin' Beauty." Beth giggled and hugged him. "You alright? You were sleepin' a long time." Beth looked down quickly then nodded. "Yeah I'm just tired I guess. And no one woke me up to tell me we'd been here a whole year already!"

Daryl:

There was somethin' up with Beth. She never slept that long, even if no one got her up. I shrugged it off. If there was somethin' wrong, I knew Beth would let me know. I laughed at her comment and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, showing her the plants we found. "So whatcha think?" She picked up a carrot out of my hand, lookin' it over closely. "These look great." She walked with me to the garden and planted it. I smiled at her and she looked back down at her work, then she gasped and covered her mouth, runnin' over behind the nearest tree to throw up. I followed on her heels and smoothed back the loose pieces of hair from around her face. "Beth, whats goin' on with you?" She looked back at me and motioned for me to follow her across the yard a ways.

"Maggie says it'll be a while before we can know for sure, but. . . Daryl, I might be pregnant." I looked down, runnin' a hand through my hair. I guess I figured it would happen eventually but I didn't expect it to be this soon. "Oh." was all I could bring myself to say before pulling her to me and resting my chin on the top of her head. "It'll be okay." She moved to look up at me, forcin' me to look down at her. "Remember I'm not sure. We have to give it time." I nodded and moved her head back under my chin, takin' in the smell of her hair as I thought about what it'd be like to have a child of my own.

Maggie:

I looked over at Beth and Daryl. It looked like she'd told him that we thought she might be pregnant. He didn't look upset, particularly, just shocked. If she was, we'd have to make runs accordingly, but I knew we could manage it. The only thought I had was that nineteen was awefully young to have a baby. I shook the thought from my head because I knew it'd be fine because Daryl would take care of her. I watched him hold her, glad he was there for my baby sister.

Beth:

"I'm scared, Daryl." All I wanted to do was cry. I didn't think I was ready to have a child, especially in this world. But I knew I was trying to make myself feel better with the flu theory. "Yeah. Honestly, I kinda am too." I looked down at his chest, unbuttoning the top part of his shirt and tracing the scar on his chest, then tracing the small one on his neck. He smiled at me. "I'm afraid of being like my father." I looked into his eyes, tears stinging mine. "You won't be. You aren't your father." He looked down and nodded. "Hey guys! You comin' back?" I looked over. It was Leigh. I waved. "Yeah! Be right there!" I held Daryl's hand as we walked back toward the others.

"So I was thinking we could start the fence behind the hotel, run it along the mountain's edge, around the front, and end it at the back where we started." Daryl nodded at Glenn while I spaced out, other things on my mind. I felt Daryl elbow me lightly to bring me back to reality. I shook the thoughts from my mind, focusing on what we had to do. "I like that idea. We should get started as soon as we can." Glenn nodded and handed Daryl an ax. "Let's start now then." He and Daryl started off to the woods, Daryl glancing back at me first. I nodded and mouthed the word "go". He nodded, looked down, and followed Glenn.

Leigh:

"Can't believe we've been here a year already!" Beth jumped and spun around, then smiled at me. "Right? There are hardly any walkers up here!" I nodded, my smile fading as I thought of my family. "And a year and a half since I lost my family." Beth frowned, pulling me into a hug. "You're part of our family now, Leigh." I smiled and hugged her tighter. "Thank you." I could feel tears start to fill my eyes and I squeezed them shut, letting the tears fall. It felt good to let them fall. I hadn't cried since the day I saw the news broadcast of the beginning of the outbreak.

"Hey, are you alright? You and Daryl seemed pretty intense over there." I pulled away from the hug and she looked down, nervous. "Oh. Um. I guess." I nodded slowly, looking around. "You wanna talk about it?" She nodded and filled me in. I covered my mouth with my hands. "Oh my god. Are you sure?" She tilted her head to the side then straighted it. "I'm pretty sure, but time will tell I guess." I hugged her again. "Yeah. If you need something though, don't hesitate to let me know. Who else knows?" She shrugged. "You, Maggie, and Daryl. But I'm thinking Maggie probably told Glenn. I'm gonna find out if she did when we get back over there." I nodded. "Sounds like a plan."

Beth:

"Hey, Maggie? Can I talk to you a sec?" Maggie nodded, dropping her shovel and coming to my side. "Did you tell Glenn what we talked about this morning? If not you probably should. He's the only one who doesn't know or figured it out." She nodded. "I will. You are so easy to read, sis."

"I am?"

"Sometimes, but not this time. Those symptoms are pretty easy to catch."

"Oh. Okay."

I laughed and walked back over to Daryl, who was digging a hole by the front of the brick hotel we called home. "What's that for?" I pointed to the hole then dropped my hand back to my side.

"Fence post goes here."

"Oh."

"Yah."

I shoved my hands into my back pockets, kicking up clumps of grass at my feet. "Need any help?" Daryl stopped digging and looked at me, concern apparent on his face and quickly changing to an obviously forced smile.

"Sure." He handed me a shovel and showed me where the next hole would need to be, so I gladly got to work, grateful for a distraction. Maybe this was why Daryl agreed to let me help. Maybe he needed a distraction as badly as I did, because I sucked at digging. By the time I thought I had my hole dug (haphazardly), Daryl had about four done and was already headed back to finish mine. I watched him dig furiously, anger or some overwhelming emotion fueling him to dig faster. I closed my eyes, listening to the click of the shovel as it hit the dirt over and over, until I didn't hear it anymore but I kept my eyes shut. I only opened them when I felt strong arms slide around my shoulders and a shaking body press against mine. I looked over to see Daryl. . . sobbing and broken. All I could do was squeeze my eyes back shut and cry with him, my arms wrapping around his waist, my face buried in his neck.


	12. Chapter 12

Daryl:

I felt like such a wuss, standin' there cryin' like a kid. Beth 'n I stood wrapped around each other, sobbin' for a long time and just lettin' go. I was the first to stop, but I stayed with my arms around Beth until she calmed down a bit. I ran my hand through her hair, doin' my best to help her somehow understand that we'd make everythin' work out.

"Let's get back to work, we gotta make this place stronger."

"How long do you think this'll last? This place. Nothing ever really seems to last nowadays."

"I don't know, but for now this is our home."

Beth smiled, still with red eyes and puffy cheeks from cyrin'. I wan't so sure I didn't look the same though. Beth nodded and looked down, wiping at her eyes. "Okay. What's next?"

"The posts. Wanna go make some?"

When she nodded I motioned for her to follow me around back to the pile of lumber for some wood. After pullin' and haulin' about a quarter of the pile, I came back to the pile for another load as Beth carried a small pile toward the front. I started to pull more planks from the pile, I started hearin' a familiar growlin' sound. I dropped the planks I already had, pullin' another board from the middle so I could see inside. I could hear footsteps behind me and looked back, signalin' Beth to stay back as I looked into the pile. There were at least three female walkers in the pile, their limbs broken and twisted around boards and crushed underneath the pile. They weren't a threat at the moment but I knew they would be soon enough, so I grabbed my huntin' knife and stuck my arm though the gap in the boards, sinkin' my knife into the first walker's skull. The pile was hollow, just a pyramid made of planks. The top had caved in, trappin' these walkers under the lumber. That guy that was at the hotel before us hadn't just killed people and put 'em in the room on the top floor. They were here too.

I couldn't get to the others so I kicked at the pile until it caved the rest of the way, lettin' me reach the other walkers. I stabbed them the same way as the first as Beth ran up behind me to help me throw 'em off the side of the mountain. Beth looked from the cliff to me. "What the hell was wrong with that psycho? First the walkers in the room, Andy, Noah. Now this?" She gestured to the side of the mountain. I just shook my head.

"He was sick." That was all I said. It was all I could say. That man had tried to kill me, had killed Andy and Noah, and had a ton of walkers stashed around the property. In my opinion, that was sick. I jerked my head toward the front of the hotel, picked up the pile of boards I had dropped and walked off, Beth on my heels.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[1 Month Later. . . ]

Maggie:

We gave it time, and Beth was definitely pregnant. A month after I found Beth throwing up in her room, I could tell that we could be sure now. There was a small and soft, yet defined outward curve to her stomach. She had already talked to Daryl about it and told Leigh. Glenn had noticed, like me, even though I was the first person Beth told when she was sure. In all honesty, I was excited but worried for my baby sister at the same time. Still, I think we all knew from the beginning that she was but we didn't want to start worrying until we knew a hundred percent. And now we did. Our home at the hotel was turning out well. Glenn and I had finished digging the rest of the holes for the fence, Beth and Daryl were working on hammering in the posts, and Leigh was following them, nailing boards across the posts to finish the fence. It had taken a month for the posts to me made because we needed so many of them but they were finally done and the fence could be put up. We were pretty well set up with food, too. Daryl went hunting about every other day, and I took the others out to forage for anything we could find, while Daryl was gone. We still found a hidden walker here and there every so often, mostly in the woods around the hotel as we went slightly farther to look for food. They had been hung and left to die and turn. Whenever we found one of the hangers, Glenn would lift me up on his shoulders and I would stab them in the head, ending them. It was sad to see so many people dead at the hands of a psychopath whom they thought would help protect them from the world we had been living in for so long. The dangers of the apocalypse turned people wild, making them do things they may never have done before the world crumbled to almost nothing.

Beth:

I looked down at my stomach poking out slightly. I was probably about four months along and starting to show, but I still couldn't believe it was actually going to happen. I had mixed feelings about it, like everyone else. I had always wanted children, but not in the middle of this. But we had a home now and even though I knew it might not last, I held on to the shred of hope that it would, for the baby's sake.

I bent down and picked up another fence post, holding it in place while Daryl hammered it into the hole in the ground. I bent back down to pack the dirt around the base of the post as Leigh followed with another plank for the horizontal bar. We only had a few more to go and finished them quickly and easily. I looked at the fence then up to Daryl, who smiled and nodded, also admiring our work. By the time we finished completely, I could barely see Daryl's face anymore because it had gotten really dark, really fast.

"Daryl? Why's it so dark? It can't be that late."

Daryl looked up at the sky and I followed his gaze up to the heavy black clouds hanging over the mountain.

"Crap. It's gonna storm pretty bad. We gotta get inside. Now."

We were behind the hotel and sadly, there wasn't a back door and it started pouring as Daryl put his hand on the small of my back, pushing me forward gently as we took off running for the front. Leigh was really fast, already to the front several seconds before we got there. By the time we flung ourselves through the front door, we were soaked and I was freezing. I wrapped my arms around myself, shivering. "I really hate the rain!" Maggie came up to me with a blanket and wrapped it around me and ushering me towards the closet where we kept most of the supplies we had accumulated in our thirteen months at the hotel, including extra food and clothing. She pulled out a bright blue tank top, a dark grey cardigan, and a light pair of jeans, which thankfully, were a little bit big on me so I could wear them a little while yet, but they wouldn't necessarily fall off my butt.

I pulled off my clothes after Maggie closed the door, and I looked back down at my belly. I could see how much it stuck out already more easily without my clothes, and I ran my hand lightly over it. "Wow, Maggie this is really gonna happen isn't it?"

"Yeah, Bethy, it is."

Maggie smiled and I pulled on the tank top and jeans, and slid the sweatshirt over my shoulders, Maggie replacing the blanket around me. By the time we left the closet, Daryl had taken off his shirt and vest, standing bare-chested in the middle of the room.


	13. Storm

Daryl:

The storm got bad fast. Every rumble of thunder shook the entire building. It felt like the whole place could come crashin' down on top of us at any moment. Beth was pacin' around the room with Leigh, nervous and jumpin' with every flash of lightnin'. I walked over to where Glenn and Maggie were sittin'. "You think this place'll hold up, Daryl." It was Glenn who spoke first.

"Yah I think so. Building's pretty sturdy."

Glenn nodded and I turned back toward Beth and Leigh just as a bolt of lightnin' shattered the glass in the window behind them, sending them both crashin' to the floor. The other three of us were by their sides right away and Glenn drug Leigh away from the window. I grabbed Beth and brought her to the middle of the room, setting her down on the floor. "You okay?"

"I thinks so. I just got some cuts from the glass." She moved to get to her feet but stopped quickly, lettin' out a pained cry. "What's wrong?" As she slumped back to the floor, I followed her gaze down to her stomach where a small piece of glass jutted out of the left side of her belly. "Oh my God." She poked at it a little, whimpering. I looked behind me at Maggie, who was attending to a cut on Leigh's elbow. "Maggie! We need your help!"

"What is it?"

"Beth has glass stickin' outta her stomach. I need you to try an' figure out how deep it is." Maggie bolted to my side, examining the shard carefully. "It doesn't look very deep, thank God." I held Beth's hand as Maggie gently pulled the small piece out. Beth put her free hand on her belly, covering the wound as Maggie ran to the closet for some bandages and alcohol. She came back, lifted up Beth's shirt, and cleaned out the wound, covering it with a square of gauze and taping it down before pulling Beth's shirt back down. She was showin' already 'n I couldn't believe I was gonna be a father in just five months. I put my hand out, lightly brushin' over her belly, careful to avoid the area where the glass was. Beth smiled at me and put her hand over mine. "Hard to believe, isn't it?" I nodded, smilin'. The idea of havin' a child was startin' to grow on me. Before I knew it, the moment was over. Beth snapped back to reality before I could bring myself to. "How's Leigh?"

"Just a couple cuts. Both of you got outta that pretty lucky."

Beth nodded. "Yeah. It could have been way worse."

Maggie cleaned the rest of Beth's cuts before movin' back to Leigh and doin' the same. Rain was pourin' in the broken window so we opted to stay at the other side of the room, behind the desk, and away from windows.

Leigh:

We waited for the storm to end, huddled under the desk. Beth was dozing off on Daryl's shoulder slowly. I was glad the glass didn't go very deep, but I hoped that falling face-first onto the floor didn't hurt Beth and Daryl's baby. A crack of thunder shook the building and I pulled my knees tightly to my chest, laying my head down on my legs. After what seemed like years, Daryl looked out the window. "Storm's over." By that time nightfall had long ago hit. Daryl stood, picking Beth up and carrying her upstairs.

* * *

Beth:

It had been two months since the storm. We had fixed the window by boarding it up and dragged all the branches out of the front yard. Daryl and I were lying in bed, trying to sleep when I felt it. I froze and waited to feel it again. Without fail there was a fluttering feeling in my stomach. I gasped, surprised and elated. "What's up?"

"I can feel the baby moving!" I covered my mouth with the hand that wasn't on my now larger, rounded belly and let out a girly, excited squeal. "Oh my God, Daryl!" I grabbed his hand and put it under mine, sitting up slowly. He grinned from ear to ear when he felt it. "Wow. . . " I leaned over and kissed him even though it was impossible to stop smiling, even for a second. I could feel tears start to well up in my eyes. Daryl hugged me and we stayed up, grinning uncontrollably until the baby calmed down and was still again. I laid back on the bed. "I can't believe this, Daryl." I looked over at him. "You know, maybe we'll be okay."

"Yeah, maybe. But we gotta be ready for the worst. Just in case."

I nodded, but I really did think we would be fine.


	14. Chapter 14

Daryl:

Not havin' anythin' to do around the hotel anymore was gettin' boring. All I did anymore was go huntin' with Glenn and come home to sit with Beth. There really wan't anythin' that needed to be done. We fixed the window from the storm and hardly saw any walkers up on the mountain. I had decided to go out huntin' again today for somethin' to do when Beth appeared next to me. "Going hunting?"

"Yah."

"Can I tag along?"

"Sure you're up for it?"

She raised her eyebrows and smirked, noddin'. "Yeah. I'll be okay."

"Alright. Let's head out. Glenn! You ready to go?"

"Ya, go ahead I'll catch up in a few!"

I turned back to Beth. "So where should we go?" She shrugged and shook her head. "I don't know. Somewhere new I guess." I nodded. We hadn't gone to the east yet. We'd gone north and south, and we obviously hadn't gone west or we'd fall.

"We're goin' east, Glenn!"

"Got it!"

I grabbed my crossbow, flingin' it across my back and puttin' a hand on the small of Beth's back as we went outside.

Beth:

My back ached as we walked, but I couldn't stand being cooped up in that hotel for another entire day, so I just told myself to grin and bear it. We had gone probably two miles before we could see were the other edge was. Along the way Daryl had shot a couple squirrels and I had collected a few handfuls of grapes. Glenn took longer than expected to catch up to us because we were just getting to the edge when we turned around at the sound of his voice. "Hey I found you guys!"

While they took inventory on what we had collected, I turned back around to look over the edge of the mountain and down the side. My breath hitched in my throat when I saw the enormous herd of walkers climbing over each other up the mountain. I reached back and grabbed Daryl's arm, unable to speak. He turned and followed my eyes, his mouth dropping open and his eyes widening. He put his arm around my waist and ushered me in the other direction. "We have time before they get up here, but not much. We should go." I let Daryl pull me away, not taking my eyes off the walkers until they were impossible to see.

I took my time composing myself. "How much time do you think we have?"

"Few days, maybe. They're movin' pretty quick."

I nodded. We needed to get back to the hotel to let Maggie and Leigh know to start packing what we could carry. We half-ran all the way back to the hotel, stumbling through the door out of breath. "Pack up what we can take with us!" As Daryl said this he grabbed several bags from behind the counter in the lobby and started filling them with food and blankets. "What's going on, Daryl?" Maggie and Leigh stood slowly, completely bewildered.

When Daryl ignored them and kept packing, I stepped in. "There are walkers coming up the mountain."

"How can they do that? Wouldn't they fall?"

"I thought so too! But they're climbing over each other to get up here. The wave of them is getting huge."

Leigh spoke this time. "Where are they?"

"Coming up the east edge. It's not as steep so it's easier for them to get up."

I wasn't just scared that walkers were on their way up to kill us, I was angry that the one place we'd been safe for a while wasn't gonna be safe in a few days. We'd have to try to find another place to be safe before the baby came. I couldn't help worrying that we wouldn't find a place and that we'd be out on the road in the middle of this mess when I had the baby. I pushed the thoughts aside and grabbed more bags, heading up to my room to collect my things. Leigh and Maggie saw what I was doing and did the same.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We stayed one more night in the building and planned to leave in the morning. When the sun began to come up we picked up all of our bags and headed out the door. Daryl said that we needed to go back toward the way we came up, back to the trails on the north side. I took a look at the east before we headed down. I could see the herd had made its way onto the top of the mountain already. Had we stayed one more day we'd have been trapped and dead for sure. "How are they moving so fast?" Daryl shook his head and pulled me by the hand toward the trail.

The storm two months before had eroded some of the trail, leaving it slicker and more uneven than when we came up. Not to mention I was six months pregnant and my balance was never very good anyway. We started down the trail, slipping and sliding most of the way. Daryl held onto one of my arms to keep me from falling and Leigh slid down beside me, digging her fingers into the dirt behind her as we made our way down.

We made it to the bottom, out of breath and disgustingly dirty and took off running. There were a few stray walkers starting to follow us but we took them down pretty easily. My back was killing me by the time we stopped and I collapsed to my knees in the dirt, gasping for breath like everyone else. I could barely speak between breaths. "Had we been up there any longer we would all be dead."

"Yeah. . ." Glenn coughed and sputtered. "Glad we weren't."

I rolled over onto my back and dropped my arms to the ground at my sides and closed my eyes. We were safe for the moment. Daryl and Leigh sat down beside me, still catching their breath. Leigh always did her best to lighten any situation somehow. "Note to self: Don't go east!"


	15. Gone

Beth:

We had been on the run, sleeping on the ground in different places for about two and a half months. I was due in less than a month and felt like a balloon. We had found a pickup truck big enough to carry us all and got up every morning to get on the move. We stopped for the night at an old gas station, where we found about three quarters of a tank of gas and a box of granola bars. It got dark quickly and as I fell asleep with Daryl in the back of the pickup I thought I faintly heard rustling leaves and cracking branches off in the distance.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When I woke up in the morning, Daryl wasn't there. I assumed he was out hunting again because we were running low on food, aside from the granola bars. Maggie and Glenn were still asleep inside the truck. I sat up and slid carefully of the bed of the truck, struggling slightly to keep my balance. I had just started around toward the front of the truck when a large hand covered my mouth and nose and a strong arm wrapped around my chest, pulling me backward. I struggled against his grip but he was far stronger than me. Still I kept fighting until something hard struck me across the back of the head, sending my vision into a blur before everything went black.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Glenn:

I woke to bright sunlight shining through the windshield and into my face. Maggie was still sleeping soundly and Daryl wasn't back from his hunt yet. I untangled myself from a thankfully heavily sleeping Maggie and hopped out of the truck, walking around the back to check on Beth. But she wasn't there. "Beth? Beth!?!? Crap this is bad. BETH!?!?!" My yelling woke Maggie, who sat up and looked at me confusedly through the window. I ran over, opening the door quickly. "Maggie, Beth's gone." She gasped and shot out of the truck, sprinting to the back to see for herself.

"Glenn! We have to find her! Where's Daryl?"

"Still hunting."

"We gotta get him and get going!" She took off into the woods by the station to find Daryl. She returned half an hour later with Daryl ahead of her, looking scared and angry. "What the hell happened?!?"

"I woke up to check on her and she was gone."

"Well we gotta find her, soon. She's almost nine months pregnant!"

Maggie chimed in. "Then let's get going!" She jumped in the truck, letting Daryl into the driver's seat and bracing herself as Daryl floored it and we flew down the road.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Beth:

I woke up on a dirty, blood soaked mattress in a small shed with a dirt floor. My left arm was handcuffed to a pipe next to the mattress and the cuffs had cut into my wrist, leaving it bloodied and sore. It was then that I noticed the stabbing pain in my lower back and realized that there was a large wet spot on the lower end of the mattress. I gritted my teeth and tried to sit up a little. The pain in my back was going away slowly when the door to the shed opened and a slightly heavyset, grey-haired man stepped inside. "'Bout time you woke up." I stayed quiet and the man shifted his weight to his other leg. "The name's Joe." I let out a groan as the pain in my back returned, sharper and stronger this time. Joe looked at me, surprised. "Won't be long now, will it? Our new member'll be here pretty soon." I squeezed my eyes shut and spoke through clenched teeth. "No." When I opened my eyes again the man was still looking at me as I let my breathing get heavier and faster. "Whatever you say." And with that he left me there alone as tears started to run down my face. So I leaned into the wall behind me, kicked off my jeans, and hoped for the best, knowing Daryl would find me before long, but not before this baby was born.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Daryl:

I had no idea where to start lookin' for Beth. I knew she could hold her own but I wasn't so sure she could if she went into labor out there by herself. Maggie broke the silence. "Do you think someone could have taken her?"

"Woulda had to. She wouldn't just leave on her own."

"Well who?"

I shrugged, thinkin' about people I knew of who might still have been alive. My mind came across a group of guys from Merle's group of friends at the bar that we'd gotten into fights with time after time. Usually over drugs. The last thing I heard from their leader, Joe had been that he'd get back at us for Merle takin' off with his stash. Maybe he couldn't find Merle 'n' I was the first one he found and he wanted to take somethin' from me for Merle takin' somethin' from him. I remembered where the old bar was and made a U-turn, startling Glenn and Maggie. "Daryl, what is it?"

"Joe."

We drove for about twenty minutes and got to the bar. An old, run-down buildin' with a nasty shed out back. I cut the engine and silently crept outta the truck, loadin' my crossbow and gun, and creepin' around the side of the buildin' to look in the window. I saw Joe inside, but just him. The window was busted out so I set my crossbow on the sill and took a shot at him, hittin' him between the shoulders, droppin' him and leavin' him squirmin' around on the floor, yellin'. I smiled as he swore, bleedin' out slowly.

I felt a hand on my shoulder and spun around. It was Maggie. "Daryl, did you hear that?" I listened closely and heard a muffled cry. It wasn't an adult though.

"Yeah. . . Maggie that's a baby!"

The sound came again and it took me a few minutes to find the source, which was the shed. Glenn handed me the ax he had brought with him and I sprinted to the shed, hammerin' away at the padlock until it snapped off. I almost ripped the door off its hinges to get inside, where I found Beth out cold and covered in sweat. I looked her over and saw the baby lyin' on the mattress between her knees, cryin'. I bolted to her side and dropped to my knees with Maggie on my heels while Glenn kept watch. Maggie took over Glenn's place and sent him to the truck for two blankets and came back beside me when he came back. She used her lighter to burn her knife clean and cut the cord, wrappin' the baby boy in one of the blankets and coverin' Beth with the other. Glenn had brought the whole bag of supplies with him when he came back, knowin' we'd need it. I used the ax to cut the chain of the cuffs, cursin' the whole time. Maggie handed my son to me while she set to wakin' Beth up, pourin' little bits of water on her face, causin' her to stir. "Beth, it's Maggie. Wake up."

She started to open her eyes, snappin' back into consciousness at the sight of her sister's face. "Maggie! How'd you find me?"

"Daryl did."

She started to cry, glad that we'd found her, but she suddenly turned frantic. "Where's the baby?" Maggie smiled and ran her hand over Beth's forehead.

"Shhh. . . Shhh. It's okay. Daryl's got the baby. " Beth calmed down and smiled weakly.

"Good. What is it?"

"It's a boy, Beth. You've got a son."

Beth's smile got bigger as she nodded. Maggie pulled a granola bar and a bottle of water out of the bag. "Here. You definitely need these." Beth thanked Maggie, who turned and gestured for me to sit in her place next to Beth as she ate. I sat down next to her and turned the baby so she could see him. "Hey little guy!" She giggled as she talked. I was smilin' about as much as I had ever smiled. It was only about three thirty and it had already been the best and the worst day of my life.

"What should we name him?" I hadn't actually thought about names yet.

"I don't know, Beth. What're you thinkin'?" She looked down at the baby and took a sip of water. She looked back up at me.

"Shawn Andrew Dixon. Shawn after my brother and Andrew after Andy." I looked at the baby and smiled.

"I like it."

Beth smiled and tried to sit up but needed help. Once she was settled I handed the baby to her and picked them up, startin' back for the truck after grabbin' Beth's knife from the pocket of her jeans on the mattress. We had an extra pair of clothes in the truck she could wear. Leigh had waited in the truck, ready to start it and drive off the second we got back in. We were almost there when I heard the pained shout.


	16. Turned

Maggie:

We had almost reached the car when I heard Glenn cry out in pain. My heart sunk to my feet as I stopped dead in my tracks. Glenn continued to scream. I spun around to see a turned Joe taking a chunk out of the back of Glenn's neck. "Glenn! No!" Walker-Joe shifted his attention from eating Glenn alive, to me. I lunged at Joe's body, ripping the bolt out of his back and pinning him to the ground through the neck to hold him in place after knocking him to the ground. I then turned, sprinting to Glenn's side as he writhed around in pain. I let the tears spill over and fall onto his bloodied shirt as he reached up and cupped a hand on my cheek. I laid my hand on top of his, still crying. "Glenn. . . " I couldn't bring my voice above a whisper. He smiled weakly at me, whispering something so lowly I had to bring my ear to his mouth to hear him.

"It'll be okay. Take care of your sister and nephew."

"I'm not leaving you." He slowly shook his head, getting weaker by the second as he bled

out slowly.

"Maggie, you need to keep moving. I can't go with you. Don't let me turn. . . please." I nodded as he smiled again, taking his last breath and coming to rest with a smile still on his face. I leaned down, lifting his head into my lap and kissing him on the lips before using my knife to make sure he wouldn't turn. I sat with him for hours, sobbing.

Finally, I dried my eyes and shot to my feet, spinning around and walking angrily toward Joe, who lay still pinned to the dirt by a bolt. I whipped out my machete and dropped down on top of Joe's body, straddling it. I proceeded to scream and cry as I hacked at him with the large knife, chopping off both arms and both legs, then severing his head without killing him. I continued to hack and slice at his body until it was mutilated beyond recognition, before cutting his head in half and ultimately ending him and chopping that up too. By the time I had calmed down, I was covered in blood from head to toe: completely soaked. I turned to face Daryl and Beth. Beth was bawling, sitting on the grass and holding Shawn against her chest. Daryl looked at me with a purely somber and apologetic expression.

"Maggie, we need to move on."

I nodded slowly. "You do."

Daryl raised an eyebrow. "And you."

I shook my head. "I'm not coming with you." I heard Beth gasp then return to sobbing, but harder.

Daryl looked at me, sadly. "You won't survive out here alone."

"I will, I promise Daryl. I just need to be alone for a while. I'll find you again sometime." I walked up to him and hugged him. "It'll be okay, I promise. I just need time to myself to grieve." He nodded solemnly and reached down to pick up Beth and Shawn before looking up and bringing them over to me. I wrapped my arms around Beth's neck and she started crying again. "Beth. . . You have a child now to take care of. I'll find you guys back, but in my own time." I leaned down a little farther, giving a sleeping Shawn a kiss on the forehead. "See you later, buddy." I followed Daryl back to the truck to get my things with a heavy heart, but I was all cried out for the day. I said a quick goodbye to Leigh and waved as they pulled out and headed down the road. I stood there watching until I couldn't see them anymore, at which point I turned on my heels and walked away.

Beth:

Maggie had left us and Glenn was dead. None of it would have happened if Joe hadn't taken off with me, making the rest of the group come after me. Glenn would be alive and Maggie would be with us still. I had stopped crying, the tears drying on my cheeks. I fed Shawn as we drove down the road, farther and farther from my sister. I laid my head back on the seat and looked out the window. No one had said a word since we left Maggie behind more than two hours ago. Leigh had fallen asleep on the back seat and I felt like I was about to, leaning back in my seat and resting Shawn on my chest as he dozed back to sleep also. It had been an entirely too-long day.

We stopped after a few more hours in the car. I decided to try my hand at walking far enough to get to the bed of the truck. Surprisingly, as weak as I was, I made it. . . slowly of course. I laid down on my side, readjusting the blanket around Shawn before placing him in front of the in the middle of the truck bed. Before long, Daryl joined us and we all knew we wouldn't get much sleep that night.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Daryl:

I woke up after apparently cryin', because I felt dry tears on my face in lines. I got off the truck bed, careful not to let it rise back up to fast and wake Beth or Shawn. I pulled my water bottle out of one of the bags, pourin' some on my hand and wipin' at my face. We'd need to go on a run for baby clothes and supplies. My son couldn't just be ridin' around naked everywhere, he needed somethin' to wear.


	17. Shawn

Beth:

I opened my eyes, my body aching. I laid there in the back of the truck until I heard that familiar southern drawl that always made me feel safer. "How ya feelin'?" I rolled slowly onto my side, carefully manuevering around Shawn, groaning slightly as the aching intensified when I moved. I squinted into the blinding sun behind Daryl's head and sighed.

"Sore and sad. But overjoyed at the same time." I looked down at our sleeping son as I said this, smiling at the sight of him curled up next to me. The truck sank just a little when Daryl climbed in next to us, reaching down and brushing the back of his fingers over Shawn's tiny little arm and grinning. 

"I miss Maggie and Glenn, but I can't help feelin' good with this little guy around." He looked up from Shawn to me. "We gotta find him somethin' to wear. We'll probably need diapers too." I nodded, looking back down at my baby boy, silently daydreaming of what he'd look like when he grew up, and how much like his daddy he would be. Already just by looking at him, you could tell he was Daryl and my son. He had Daryl's piercing blue eyes, my nose, and a head full of bonde hair. I looked back at daryl and smiled. 

"You haven't held him yet. Here." I knew he had held Shawn the day he was born, but he didn't have enough time to really spend taking in the fact that he had a son, with all that was happening that day, so I carefully slid a hand under Shawn's head and the other arm under his body, lifting him up towards Daryl, who shied away slightly. "Daryl, what's wrong?" He looked petrified, frozen in place. 

"I don't wanna be like my dad. I don't wanna do somethin' wrong." My heart broke hearing him say this. I knew he wouldn't be anything like his father, he was too good a man. I continued toward him with Shawn as I spoke.

"You won't be like him. You don't have to be afraid, Daryl. You're more of a man than your father ever was. You won't do anything wrong, I promise." He seemed to relax at least a little at this, reaching out slightly and taking Shawn in his arms. I guided one of his elbows to support Shawn's head, and Daryl adjusted the other so that he was comfortably holding his child close to his body. The second that baby was in his arms, his eyes lit up and he grinned, suddenly knowing he would be better than his father now that he'd gotten to hold Shawn.

"Wow, Beth. . . " I smiled when Shawn yawned and opened his eyes to look up at Daryl, making little noises and flailing his tiny fists and legs. Daryl gasped and grinned wider when Shawn pulled his mouth into a toothless smile. "Hey little guy." He shifted Shawn to one arm and used his now free hand to touch Shawn's fist, which opened up and grabbed Daryl's thumb, or most of it anyway. His puny little hand wasn't big enough to fit all the way around his daddy's big thumb, so he settled for what he could grasp on to, smiling the whole time. I sat up and scooted over to be next to him, ignoring the pain I felt every time I made a move. I put a hand on his back, running it in circles. 

"You're doing great. Already an amazing daddy." I took his eyes off the baby only long enough to glance at me, still grinning. "You wanna head out and get some stuff for him. Like diapers and clothes?" He nodded, staying completely still for another few minutes. 

Daryl:

My fear of being like my father was destroyed the minute my son was in my arms and I got a good look at him. He looked just like Beth, and even me. I rocked him back and forth before slidin' off the end of the truck, using my free hand to help Beth slide off after me, supportin' her as she stood. "Take it easy, hon." She smiled at me as I helped her to the the passenger side of the truck, where Leigh was still sleepin' in the back seat. She slid into the seat and I carefully handed Shawn to her, wrapped in a spare t-shirt we had in the bag when he was born. I shut the door and walked around to my side, slidin' over the hood and makin' the truck bounce, wakin' Leigh up and makin' Beth laugh. Shawn smiled at the sound of his (beautiful) mother's voice, makin' soft cooin' noises up at her. 

We drove for a few hours, stoppin' here and there along the way and searchin' houses, not comin' up with much more than a half-box of diapers. We stopped again in a small neighborhood after about four hours to search some more and eat lunch. Leigh handed both of us a granola bar, keepin' one for herself, while Beth fed Shawn. 

When I was done eatin' I started the truck back up and we took off again. It wasn't long before we came to another small neighborhood, pullin' into a cauldesac to search houses for anythin' we could use. I had a bad feelin' about the fact that there weren't any walkers 'round, but I got out of the truck with Leigh to start checkin', leavin' Beth and Shawn waitin' in the passenger seat. Leigh led the way to a little brown ranch at the very end of the cauldesac. I knocked loudly on the door and waited after openin' it. I heard shufflin' around, but no walkers came out. So I yelled. "Hey! Come on out!" More shufflin' then a voice I'd heard before but Leigh hadn't.

"Daryl?"


	18. Home Again

Daryl:

I froze in place at the sound of Carol's voice. Shit, this was gonna be awkward, but I was glad to know she was alive either way. "Yeh, it's me. I've got three others with me."

"Who?" I sighed.

"Leigh, Beth, and Shawn." She came out of her hiding place to see Leigh and I.

"Where are the other two?" I gestured toward the truck as Carol ran to hug me.

"Listen, Carol there's somethin' I need to tell ya. . . " She cut me off, already headed for the truck after callin' down the others. Rick, Carl, Lil' Ass Kicker, Michonne, and a few new people were all there.

"Can't it wait until we get you guys settled in?" I turned to follow Carol, but she'd already gotten to the truck. "Oh. So this is Shawn." She sounded sad, havin' figured out that Shawn was my son, and Beth's. She turned to me and forced a smile. "Congratulations, Daryl. He's handsome, just like you." I nodded as she walked slowly back to the house. I turned back to the truck and took Shawn, using my other hand to help Beth out of the truck. She was okay walkin' by then, but she still had to be careful. Immediately the rest of the people there were on us, huggin' us and tellin' us they were so happy we were alive. Rick clapped me on the shoulder and congratulated Beth and I on the new baby, followed by everybody else. Beth was grinnin' and huggin' Michonne and Carl as they walked to the house.

Beth:

I couldn't believe that we just stumbled upon almost everyone we'd lost in the fall of the prison. I wished Maggie had come with us so she could be safe with all of us too. I also wished Carol didn't feel so bad seeing Daryl and I were together with a child. I felt bad that my relationship with Daryl hurt her so badly.

When we got inside I sat down on the couch slowly. "So how old is the baby?" I looked up to see a face I didn't recognize, as she jerked it toward Shawn, who was asleep in Daryl's arms. Standing above me was an Asian woman about me and Leigh's age with jet black hair tied back in a tight, messy bun. I smiled warmly as I answered.

"Three and a half days." The woman sat down next to me, smiling.

"He's very cute. . . How are you feeling?" I breathed a slight laugh.

"Much better than I was, thank you." She stuck out her hand for me to shake, and I did.

"I'm Mai. Mai Tsuda." I nodded, still smiling.

"Beth Greene. It's nice to meet you, Mai." She nodded to me.

"And you, the same."

I looked back around the room, finding only two more faces I didn't recognize. There was a man a little older than me and another quite a bit older than Daryl, but a bit younger than my dad, and a boy about Carl's age. Daryl was talking to them and the others, introducing them to Shawn and Leigh. I smiled, thinking about how comfortable Daryl had become with Shawn since holding him the first time. "Is that dad?" I covered my mouth, grinning. I had forgotten that Mai was right next to me. I nodded, my hand still over my mouth while Mai giggled. "He seems like a very good one." I nodded again.

"He is."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We sat around the stone fireplace that night, catching up. I left it up to Daryl and Leigh to fill the rest of the group in on the situation of Shawn's birth, because it wasn't really something that was easy for me to talk about. I had a difficult time not crying through hearing the day retold through the eyes of someone watching from the outside. Glenn's death and Maggie's leaving were the hardest parts. I sat in an old rocking-recliner in the corner of the living room, rocking Shawn, who was still clothed in only a diaper. We'd find something soon for him to wear. Good thing it hadn't gotten cold yet.

Daryl:

Everybody finally decided it was time to turn in for the night. I made a point ta meet all three of the new people and make sure everyone was introduced to Leigh. I didn't want anybody to be strangers if we were livin' together. I met Cam Black and his uncle, Kenneth, along with Mai Tsuda, who'd tagged along with them when they found her stranded in an old apartment buildin', surrounded by walkers. We were plannin' to go on a run in the mornin'. The camp was runnin' low on food and water, and we still needed supplies for Shawn.

I stood and walked over to the large recliner in the corner of the room where I found Shawn curled up on Beth's chest, both of them out like a light. I smiled and sat down on the floor next to the chair, restin' my head on Beth's knee and fallin' asleep quickly. I had never been so grateful or relieved as the day I found Beth in that shed behind the bar after killin' Joe. I thought I'd never see her again, never meet my son. I felt terrible that I wasn't there for her when Shawn was born, but she'd told me over and over that it wasn't my fault, it was Joe's. I just wished I could have been there. I didn't know what I would have done if somethin' had gone wrong, but bein' there would have been important. The fact that I couldn't made me angry. Every time I talked to Beth about it she said that all that mattered was that she and the baby were back safe with me. And every time I'd just give in and agree with her through the guilty feelin' I still had. I shouldn't 'a gone huntin' that day. If I'd 'a just stayed back I could've stopped Joe before he took her and she wouldn't have been alone.


	19. Supply Run

Beth:

When I opened my eyes and groggily pushed myself further back into the chair, Shawn and Daryl were gone. Panic struck me and held on for at least thirty seconds before I bolted out the door as fast as I could to find them on the front deck of the house. I could hear Daryl softly humming the tune to "Be Good" as he slowly bounced back and forth as he paced around the deck, Shawn cuddled close to his chest, wrapped in a jacket. I sighed and smiled, at the same time sitting slowly onto the bench swing, watching them quietly, not wanting to ruin the moment. I wondered if Daryl had heard me come out, but he didn't turn around, just kept rocking Shawn and humming, attempting to sing a line or two every now and then. I covered my mouth to muffle a soft laugh so Daryl wouldn't hear. I watched as Shawn's eyes slowly fell shut as he drifted off to sleep. I'd come to notice that whenever Shawn slept, he'd bring his arm up to his face and seem to be trying to fit his entire fist in his mouth. Daryl sang quieter and quieter until he had become silent and began talking to Shawn softly in almost a whisper. "There ya' go, all better, right?" That's when he finally turned around, still bouncing slightly back and forth, as if by habit. He saw me and smiled, coming over to sit next to me in the swing. I leaned over, resting my head on his shoulder sleepily. I was just starting to doze off when Shawn stirred in Daryl's arms, starting to cry softly. I lifted my head and reached over, letting him wrap his tiny hand around my index finger.

"Oh yeah, that's right. We need baby stuff for you, don't we?" The corners of Daryl's mouth tugged upward into a warm smile as he watched me play with Shawn's fingers with my thumb and mumble cooing noises quietly. "Don't worry, we'll take care of you. I promise." I stood, turning to Daryl and taking Shawn in my arms and shifted him until he rested on only one arm. I reached down, sliding my free hand into Daryl's, pulling him up to stand next to us. I led him into the house, where everyone had gotten up since I'd gone outside. I let go of Daryl's hand and walked over to Leigh, who was sitting on the floor reading an old, worn-out book. I cleared my throat when she didn't look up, having not noticed my presence. She jumped slightly, a little startled and looked up.

"Oh, hey! What's up?" I smiled and sat down next to her by the fireplace.

"What'cha reading?" She flipped the cover closed, keeping her thumb inside the book to hold her place. The front read "Treasure Island" by Robert Louis Stevenson. I'd read it before, but never finished the whole thing. In fact, I'd been reading it when the prison fell and I'd left it in my cell where it probably burned down to nothing but ash like the rest of the place. "Treasure Island. That's a good book." She smiled.

"You've read it?" I nodded.

"Most of it, anyway. It's back at the prison in my cell." She looked down at the book.

"When I get to the end of this copy, you can have it if you want." I widened my eyes as a grin pulled at my lips.

"Really? I'd love that!" She nodded and a short silence followed as she went back to reading. I looked down at Shawn, who'd fallen back to sleep.

"Leigh?" She looked back up.

"Yeah?"

"Are you going on the run today?" She shook her head and placed a scrap of paper inside her book to mark her spot.

"Nope. I'm staying back with Mai and Cam today." I nodded.

"Would you mind watching Shawn while we're out?" Her eyes lit up as she grinned, nodding.

"Not at all! He'll be safe here with us." I nodded, smiling as I shifted Shawn in my arms to hold him out to Leigh, who slid her arms underneath mine, taking him and holding him close to her body. I sighed, relieved and sat back on my knees, standing up just as Daryl came to get me.

"So I guess we're heading out then." Leigh nodded, smiling. I looked at Daryl as he took my hand and started to lead me toward the front door, before turning around to Leigh.

"We're plannin' to be gettin' back in a day or so. Keep the doors blocked and avoid the windows." Leigh nodded as we turned back around and followed the rest of the group out the door.

Daryl:

On the way out the door, I picked up the large navy blue duffel bag we stashed in the closet, slingin' it over my shoulder and tossin' it in the bed of the truck before gettin' in the driver's seat and crankin' the engine. Beth sat in the passenger seat, markin' the nearby stores and shoppin' centers with a red X, and tracin' the path we'd follow to get there. I followed the line to the first store, a small Wal-Mart center 'bout ten miles from the house. We got out and pounded on the windows and doors for a good five minutes then waited for somethin' to happen. In less than three minutes, at least fifty walkers crowded the front of the store, beatin' on the glass at us. I pulled my crossbow off my back, loadin' it and aimin' it at the door. I gestured to Rick to open the door and let a walker or two out. Three lurched through the door where Carol and Carl waited with their knives. Each of them took a walker as I put down the third. I waved Beth back as she started to come forward as the next few walkers came out. She'd just given birth a little less than a week ago and we had plenty of people to take care of the walkers.

After takin' down about thirty walkers, the store was clear. There wasn't much left inside that wasn't trashed, but we found almost an entire trashbag full of canned food that was in good condition, 'cept a few dents in the cans, which didn't affect the fact that it was edible and we needed it. 

The next store we hit was a baby store down the road a ways. The store was already pretty much cleared, a single walker roamin' the isles: a worker with stringy brown hair and a torn-up, blood-soaked dress. I put her down quickly while the rest of the group spread to seperate sections of the store, lookin' for anythin' and everythin' we could use for Lil' Ass Kicker and Shawn. I searched the worker for the keys to the display cases, findin' them in the pocket of her uniform vest. I stood as a hand fell onto my shoulder, turnin' to face Beth beside me. "Hey." She smiled and followed the greetin' with a light kiss, barely touchin' her mouth to mine. I smiled and wrapped an arm around her waist.

"Find anythin'?" She nodded and slid her backpack off her shoulder and unzippin' the first pocket with a grin on her face. She slowly pulled out a small, baby-blue dreamcatcher. Little blue beads dotted the center threads and feathers of the same light-blue color hung from three beaded strings on the bottom of the ring. I reached out, holdin' one of the soft feathers between my fingers and smilin'.

"I thought maybe we could personalize it for him. . ." She reached into her pocket, pullin' out a large handful of small, square, wooden tiles as she spoke. ". . . and put his name on it." I took out my knife, takin' four tiles from her hand. I carefully carved a letter into each until I had spelled out Shawn. I then took six more tiles and carved the letters for Elliot into those. Finally, I carved Dixon into another five. Beth grinned, stashin' the lettered tiles back in her pocket and takin' my knife to the last two tiles. Into one she carved a songbird, and into the other she carved a crossbow. She put those into her pocket and pulled a bottle of superglue out of her other pocket. "I also got this to help us out." She couldn't help gigglin' as she spoke. The light, bubbly sound made my day. Seein' her alive and happy was all I needed to keep me goin'. She gently put the dream catcher back into her backpack and took my hand, intertwinin' our fingers. "We should keep looking." I nodded and let her lead the way, followin' her back to the more crowded part of the store.

We came out with everythin' we needed. Apparently no one had hit the baby store when the apocalypse started. Or at least not this one. We hit the rest of the stores without any injury and headed back much earlier than we'd expected. We stopped for the night, sleepin' in cars and takin' off first thing in the mornin'. We got back around nine AM the next day. Leigh opened the door for us when we rolled up to the house. "That was quick!" I nodded.

"Yeah, not too many walkers in the way. We got everythin' we'll need for a while." She smiled and nodded, handin' Shawn to Beth, who hugged him close and kissed his head, whisperin' to him about how much she missed him. I grinned, watchin' 'em for a minute before headin' back outside to help unload the cars. When we got everythin' out and into the house, I stopped next to Beth to see Shawn before settin' to puttin' the new crib together and placin' it next to Lil' Ass Kicker's. Beth came over and laid a now-sleepin' Shawn on the mattress. She then took out the glue, tiles, and dream catcher from her backpack and motioned for me to sit with her at the card table in the corner of the room, where she set to gluin' on the tiles. She put the word Shawn on the top, followin' the curve of the ring and doin' the same with Dixon along the bottom. She put Elliot in the middle, splittin' the word in two, three letters to each side of the hole in the middle. Finally, she glued the songbird to the beaded string on the far left, and the crossbow on the right string, leavin' the middle string plain. Once it had dried, we hung it from the foot of his crib, to the inside so he could always see it.


	20. Peace

Okay, so this was supposed to be the last chapter but I'm going to extend it one more but this one will be REALLY short. Sorry but it's late and the rest of this part of the story would be better off as its own chapter. :D

[I year later. . .]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Beth:

I stared wide-eyed, gripping Daryl's arm as Shawn took his first, unbalanced, toddling steps and fell into his father's waiting arms. Daryl cheered softly and Shawn grinned, revealing a few tiny, white teeth. I took my baby boy's face in my hands and planted kisses all over his face, making him giggle loudly as he flailed his arms, his little hands finding their way to my face and lying flat on my cheeks. Shawn pressed his forehead to mine and I stayed there with him, unwilling to let the moment go just yet. I finally took him in my arms and let him rest his head on my shoulder, hearing him yawn sleepily in my ear. I turned to the right to face the kitchen table, taking the copy of "Treasure Island" that Leigh had given me and carried my little boy to the large recliner, sitting down and opening the book to my page. By now I'd read the book several times, but it never got old. With Shawn on my shoulder, dozing, I began reading to him and myself like I had every night. Within minutes the baby was asleep on my shoulder and I closed the book, standing carefully and carrying the child to his crib.

I turned around to see Daryl now fiddling with the old radio he'd found on a run the day before. We'd long-since given up on hearing from any other survivors but it was something to do on a long, uneventful day. We'd been at (what we considered) peace for a year now and it was easy to get bored with plenty of supplies and walkers trapped outside and cleaned out just once a day.

I crouched down beside him, snaking my arm behind his back, rubbing circles there as I rested my head on his shoulder. He pulled his hand away from the dials on the small rectangular box when it had settled on a channel with slightly less static than the others, before dropping onto his back and shifting to prop his feet up on the busted, ripped couch. I laid down to his left and did the same as he laid an arm under my head. I closed my eyes and listened to the quiet of the old little home we'd found. The only sounds that could be heard were of the static across the room and the far-off growls of distant walkers. Neither Daryl nor I said anything, but we stayed silent, enjoying the peace. In the past year our group had cleared and fortified all of the other houses on the cauldesac. Daryl, Shawn, and I had one, Rick, Judith, Carl and Michonne had one. Carol, Mai, Leigh, Sasha, Cam, and Kenneth shared the big, two story house on the corner where the barrier of cars and plywood separated us from the living dead.

My eyes darted open as the constant static from the radio cut out slightly and was partially replaced by a man's voice. I sat up quickly, waking a sleeping Daryl who quickly heard the voice and jumped up, racing to the radio and cranking the volume dial. As he did so I pushed myself to my feet and tiptoed quietly down the short hallway, clicking Shawn's nursery door shut and turning on my heels to pad back down the hall and listen to the message cutting through the sound waves.

". . . cure has been. . . Florida CDC in Tallahassee for. . . put down all remaining walkers and. . . until you. . . cured." Daryl shot me a look that I knew meant to run for the others. I dashed out the door and raced to each door, banging and yelling at them to come to ours before moving on to the next house and repeating the pattern before returning to mine, everyone hot on my trail. I took back my place beside the radio as everyone flooded in behind me, dropping to the floor to hear more easily as the voice repeated the message over and over. Daryl turned to look at Rick, the rest of the group following suit, waiting for direction, as they always had expected from Rick. He looked around the room, thinking hard before he raised his hands and quickly dropped them back to his sides.

"I guess were going to Tallahassee. Pack up. We'll leave in two days."


	21. Tallahassee

[Two days later. . . ]

Daryl:

I knealt down, gently pullin' the sleepin' blonde figure into my arms as she yawned and shifted in my arms. It was early and I knew she'd have wanted me to wake her up but I couldn't bring myself to do just that. I loved how peaceful she looked and I wanted her to sleep as long as she could. She stirred slightly and I loosened my grip to let her move if she wanted to. She slowly inched closer to my body, pressing her face up against my chest. The dim mornin' light illuminated her features as I brought her impossibly closer to me. It was unusually cold, so I wrapped Beth in the thick blanket she'd been asleep under before stepping outside with her. I set her down gently in the truck and shut the door quietly before gettin' in myself as Leigh brought Shawn out. Mai slid in on the other side of Shawn, in the back of the cab, and we set out just behind the other cars. We were off to Tallahassee to end this: the sufferin', the loss, everythin'.

Two hours later, Beth woke up fully. She wiped at her eyes groggily and looked around. Realizing that she was sittin' in the movin' truck, she turned suddenly, to me. "Daryl! Why didn't you wake me up?!" I shot her a half-smile and she slugged my arm playfully, a smirk plastered to her face.

"You were lookin' so peaceful. I couldn't just wake 'ya up!" She smiled at me and glanced back at Shawn before settlin' back into her seat and sighin'.

"How far have we gone?" Beth turned her head to rest on her headrest while she looked out the window.

"Won't be too much longer. Four more hours maybe." She nodded once and closed her eyes again.

Beth:

I shut my eyes, feeling safe surrounded by my family. The fields and old towns passing by my window reminded me of all that had been lost: all that would, in time, hopefully be there again. I hoped that Tallahassee would work out. We needed something to work out. Daryl had turned the radio in the car to the station where we'd first heard the news of the cure. It was comforting to hear the voice, even though it was only droning on and on with the same monotonous words. I stretched out my left arm, my hand finding its way to Daryl's and resting on top of his before he intertwined our fingers.

We found our way to Tallahassee sooner than we thought, pulling up to the CDC less than three hours later. Outside the building looked like a war zone, but there were people pulling up to the center by the truckload, obviously there for the same reason that we were: to help rid the world of the un-dead. I squeezed Daryl's hand and grinned. "We made it."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My heart sank a little the minute we stepped into the building. The first rooms we walked through looked just like the outside of the building: as if a bomb had gone off. Even so, we plowed on, determined to scope out the whole building before giving up. The next few rooms seemed a little better than the first: cleaner and less. . . broken down. The rooms got continually better and better as we went inward, followed by countless other people. My hopes began to rise again as we reached the research area of the building. Doctors, nurses, and scientists lined the halls, whisking us away as we approached. I held tight to Shawn and Daryl as we entered a small examination room, where we were injected with several different types of medications, none of which I could pronounce the name of. Shawn squirmed but didn't cry when he got his shots: tough like his Daddy, who didn't even flinch. I, on the other hand, let out a surprised squeal when the first needle entered my arm, catching me off guard. I busted into laughter when my eyes locked on Daryl's and I caught his amused expression.

The doctor told us that after everyone had gotten their injections, exactly at midnight, they would set off a radio wave that would connect the drugs and create a barrier from the disease for all of us. They'd also rewired radio towers to not only transmit the message we had received, but also stronger waves, that would put down all or most of the walkers that remained in the world. All that would be left up to us was cleanup duty. We'd no longer be infected, and bites were only a threat to us because of the bloodloss factor, so we'd still have to be careful.

It would be our job to rebuild the world to what it once was, and I knew we could do it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Just before midnight, many of the people who'd been cured gathered at the glass wall of the CDC to wait for the waves to go. The countdown started at one minute to midnight and butterflies filled my stomach as we got to the last few numbers.

"THREE!"

"TWO!"

"ONE!"

"GOOOO!!!"

Barely visible waves of energy radiated from towers surrounding the CDC of Tallahassee, dropping every walker in sight. We waited for them to get back up; to not be completely dead. When they didn't though, we celebrated. It was confirmed that all of the towers had functioned according to plan, and the world had been cured. I turned to Daryl, who still held Shawn on an arm, and threw mine around his neck, planting a long kiss on his lips.

"It's finally over." The voice wasn't mine, nor Daryl's. It was one I knew well, but hadn't heard in far too long. I whirled around, pulling the owner of the voice into a tight hug before I had even seen their face.

My sister hugged me back with as much, if not more force than I held her with. She'd survived, and found us back. I'd missed her so much in the year she'd been gone from us. Tears spilled from my eyes as I tried to speak. "Maggie. . ." I choked out. "I missed you."

"I know, Bethy. I missed you too. But it's over now. We're finally safe."


End file.
